In Kherson region, the contract for the repair of a lyceum was awarded to a company with tender scandals

In Kherson region, a newly formed consortium was awarded the contract to renovate the canteen of the Dariivka community lyceum. The contract was awarded without competition, despite the dubious reputation of the founding firms and their links to previous scandalous tenders in Ternopil and Kherson regions.

This was reported by Vgoru.

At the end of 2023, the Dariivka village council published a project for the overhaul of the canteen and food unit in one of the community's lyceums. The DREAM platform also published photos of the state of the canteen and dining room.

The project budget amounted to UAH 10.7 million. In July 2025, the village council announced open bidding on Prozorro with an expected cost of over UAH 11 million. Part of the funds were allocated from the local budget, the rest was a subvention from the state budget, and the project was co-financed by the EU under the Ukraine Facility program.

Only the newly created consortium, Magistral Plus, responded to the tender. Due to the lack of competitors, no auction was held, and the village council signed the contract on August 19, 2025. The works are to be completed by December 31, 2025.

The Magistral Plus consortium was established on June 6, 2025, and its founders are Valk Construction Company LLC and Avtomagistral-Zakhid LLC. The latter company is associated with Serhiy Yuzvishyn, who in just one year became the owner of several companies that won public tenders worth more than a billion hryvnias. Prior to that, Yuzvishyn's companies were linked to the former head of the Ternopil Oblast Road Service, Bohdan Yulyk, who was featured in journalistic investigations into the division of roads into hundreds of small sections and evasion of open tenders.

The schemes of Yulyk and his entourage allowed companies to bypass Prozorro: deals were made for up to 200 thousand hryvnias to avoid open tenders, and the total value of contracts reached tens of millions.

The Valk construction company, the second founder of the consortium, also has a scandalous past. Its founder was Ihor Tabaliuk, a former official of the Ternopil Regional State Administration convicted of bribery. The company won government tenders worth tens of millions, and after 2022, its revenues dropped significantly, unlike Avtomagistral-Zakhid, which continues to receive billions of dollars in contracts.

Avtomagistral-Zakhid is also linked to Global Build Engineering, a company involved in tender scandals in Kherson region. Journalists have previously linked the company to the deputy head of the Kherson Regional State Administration, Anton Samoilenko.

Recently, despite the availability of a cheaper alternative, the tender for the reconstruction of the main water supply system in Kherson region was won by the company with the highest bid. Previously, the same company was involved in criminal proceedings and journalistic investigations for alleged misappropriation of budget funds.

Анна Літман