In the period from November 6, 2010 to November 4, 2013, the mayor in Odessa was Alexei Kostusev. Where is this politician now, who has been elected to the Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada three times, having a doctorate in economics and is a honored economist of Ukraine? Some Ukrainian journalists are trying to answer this question.
From the biography of a statesman and public figure
Kostusev Aleksei Alekseevich - the son of a marine border guard. He is a native of the Sakhalin city of Nevelsk. Date of birth - 06/29/1954
Alexey spent his school years in Odessa.
In 1970, he became a student at the Odessa Institute of National Economy, who graduated five years later with honors.
In 1975, he was called up for military service in the Soviet army.
After being demobilized by a senior sergeant in 1977, Alexei Kostusev, whose biography has been associated with one organization for more than fifteen years, got a job in Odessa in an institute where engineers of the navy were trained. He started as a junior researcher, then became an assistant professor and head of the department.
For three years, he led the student squad "Five-Year Guardsman, " who worked in Tiksi Bay beyond the Arctic Circle.
In "Komsomolskaya Pravda" it was noted that this construction team became the winner of the All-Union Socialist Competition.
In 1980, Kostusev Alexey Alekseevich received his Ph.D. His dissertation covered the topic "Socialist working lifestyle in the conditions of scientific and technological revolution."
Change of scope
Since 1991, Kostusev was appointed to the post of deputy chairman in the Kiev district executive committee of Odessa.
The following year, he was elected as chairman of the Odessa City Committee on Privatization.
In 1993, Kostusev Alexei Alekseevich, with a group of like-minded people, organized the collection of several thousand signatures of the inhabitants of Odessa so that the Russian language received official status in this city.
After the report voiced by him at the city council, the meeting participants adopted a resolution stating that Odessa enterprises, institutions and organizations can use the Russian language at work on an equal footing with Ukrainian.
Party affiliation
For his social and political activities, Alexei Kostusev had to join various political parties and associations.
In 1991, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was liquidated, and therefore its membership in it was terminated.
As a non-partisan Kostusev, Aleksei Alekseevich joined the Left Center association, which included the Socialist Party, the Peasant Party, and various non-partisan politicians.
Later, he moved to the "Labor Ukraine", where he pulled himself out into the leaders and entered the political executive committee.
Since 2002, he became the head of the Soyuz political party.
In early 2006, Viktor Yanukovych invited Kostusev and other party leaders of the Union to join the Party of Regions. At that time, all the "anti-orange" forces of Ukraine united in this organization.
Since that time, Kostusev joined the presidium of the political council of this party, from where he has not left until now.
Parliamentary Activities
Since 1998, Kostusev was elected to the Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada of the third convocation. He ran for the block of the Socialist Party of Ukraine from the Selyansk Party of Ukraine.
He was put in the Ukrainian parliament at the head of the Rada’s commission of inquiry, whose functions included verifying the effectiveness of the Cabinet’s work in providing Ukrainians with electric energy.
Based on the results of the commission’s work in this industry, order was put in place, and regular regular blackouts of the population that had taken place earlier were stopped.
Since February 2000, Kostusev was headed by one of the committees in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, dealing with economic issues, managing the national economy, property and investment.
Work in the Antimonopoly Committee
Since June 2001, Kostusev headed the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine (AMCU). He held the post of chairman of this structure for seven years.
He managed to organize tight control over the activities of the monopolists by the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine, to prevent collusion. On his part, much attention was paid to problems affecting the vital interest of the broadest strata of Ukrainians. He led an active fight against rising prices for basic foodstuffs and gasoline.
The Antimonopoly Committee managed to establish a recalculation system in case of non-provision of heat and water supply services.
For seven years, the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine contributed to the return of more than three billion hryvnias to Ukrainians. In particular, about 252 million were returned to Odessa residents.
The leadership of the two firms that set higher gas prices was fined 100 million hryvnias.
In 2003, at the direction of the Antimonopoly Committee, the Odessa City Executive Committee revised water supply tariffs.
Residents of Odessa did not have to pay twice for the loss of water in the house network, which led to an annual savings of over ten million hryvnias.
Fighting Collusion
In 2005, the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine under the leadership of Kostusev fined five companies, seeing in their actions the existence of a conspiracy, as a result of which sugar prices were increased. The total amount of fines amounted to seventeen million hryvnias.
In 2007, Kostusev stopped growth, and then managed to lower the price of sunflower oil. Firms that overstated the price of oil were fined about one million hryvnias each.
The American company Western Union, under pressure from the Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine, had to reduce the tariff for transferring money from states where more than 7 million people work from Ukraine by four times. As a result of this, up to $ 150 million, which had previously "sailed" abroad, began to remain in the families of Ukrainians every year.
In 2004, Kostusev Aleksei Alekseevich was elected to the post of chairman in the Interstate Council for Antimonopoly Settlement in the CIS countries. Nationality "Ukrainian" was first represented at this post.
Later, he took the place of honorary chairman in this structure.
Kostusev constantly remembered Odessa. In particular, the negative activity of Odessaoblenergo, which abused its monopoly status, was suppressed. After the imposition of penalties in the state budget, this company returned more than one hundred thousand hryvnias.
In 2010, Kostusev was again approved by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine as chairman of the AMCU.
The mayor of Odessa
10/31/2010 Kostusev was elected the mayor of Odessa. His closest rival E. Hurwitz, who had previously been the Odessa mayor, he was twenty percent ahead of the vote.
Exactly three years later, on October 31, 2014, Kostusev voluntarily resigned.
Political scientists said that the resignation of the Odessa mayor was caused by an increase in claims against him from the leaders of the state and the Party of Regions in connection with his pro-Russian sentiments.
Kostusev himself said that he resigned after they began to put pressure on him, trying to persuade him to vile actions. They demanded that he destroy the business of Igor Markov, with whom Kostusev had close friendly relations.
