Bratski cells of discord in Mohylanka. Who brought them to a dreadful state, and what do the ‘Servants’ have to do with it?
The scandal surrounding the restoration of the Bratski Cells, located on the territory of the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, has been ongoing for almost half a year and reached its peak in early April.
Mohyla filed a lawsuit against the State Inspection for Architecture and Urban Planning. This was reported by the head of the university, Serhiy Kvit, to the public initiative “Holka”. In reality, Mohyla became a hostage to political games, as detailed by the public initiative “Holka”.
One of Ukraine’s leading universities demands the cancellation of the State Architecture and Urban Planning Inspection’s order for an unscheduled inspection, conducted based on an anonymous tip. The author of this tip is the assistant to a deputy of the Kyiv City Council from the Servant of the People party, Dmytro Perov. He signed the letter as the head of the NGO “Spadshchyna”, which he is not. According to the law, there should have been no response to this appeal at all, but the head of the Servant of the People party, Olena Shulyak, decided to contact the State Inspection, and the inspection began.
Mohyla filed a lawsuit after the Ministry of Restoration, headed by Deputy Prime Minister Oleksandr Kubrakov, announced that a fine of over 90 thousand hryvnias had been imposed on the customer of the work.
The extremely fundamental question remains open: how did a monument of national historical significance end up in a state of emergency, and what role did Mohyla play in this?
Those who accuse Mohyla of the destruction of the cells actively use in communication the indefinite lease agreement of 1993, under which the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy undertook a number of obligations regarding the maintenance of this communal property in proper condition.
Photo: NaUKMA
Everyone concerned with the protection of monuments has long been accustomed to the shameful practice of developers: historical buildings are deliberately brought to ruin either to completely demolish them and build something new, or to leave only the load-bearing walls (so-called ‘facadism’). In Kyiv alone, there are dozens, if not hundreds, of such cases, and across Ukraine, there are thousands of monuments facing similar situations.
So, at first glance, everything seems obvious: if the Fraternity Cells, 30 years after being transferred to Mohyla, are in a state of emergency, then who, besides Mohyla, could have brought them to such a condition?
Screenshot from the briefing video accusing Mohyla of destroying the Bratski Cells
But besides the exclusive documents from 1993, there are also other ones – significantly more recent and publicly available in the official database of Ukrainian legislation.
By the decree of the President of Ukraine in 2008 “On the celebration of the 400th anniversary of the National University ‘Kyiv-Mohyla Academy’,” the Cabinet of Ministers, jointly with the Kyiv City State Administration, was instructed to consider the issue of transferring to the University the buildings of the Prior’s Corps, the Bratski Cells, and the Prosfirnia, while ensuring the resolution of the issue of providing other premises for the accommodation of Kyiv Clinical Hospital No. 15.
The decree of the President of Ukraine in 2008, which instructed to resolve the issue of transferring the Bratski Cells to the possession of Mohyla
This decree refutes the claims of those who stated that Mohyla received the cells in 1993. Thus, the difference in the time span is 15 (!) years, and it took a presidential decree for this clarification.
In 1993, the State Historical and Architectural Reserve “Ancient Kyiv” concluded a lease agreement for the cells with Mohyla, but according to the Acceptance-Transfer Act for the execution of this contract, the building was never transferred to Mohyla.
The building remained in communal ownership, so for its transfer to the National University, as a state institution, the state authorities had to negotiate with the Kyiv city authorities. At that time, the building was not vacant; it was used as an administrative building and a pathology-anatomical department of Municipal Clinical Hospital No. 15.
Bratski cells, photo: Heorhyi Mohylnyi‘s Facebook page
Supposedly, they agreed on this a year after the contract was signed – the Government issued a relevant order agreeing to transfer the building to the Scientific Research Institute “Synthesis and Ecology,” but after the relocation of the research institute to other premises.
However, the chain of exchange “Mohyla – Hospital No. 15 – research institute – new premises for the research institute” somehow failed and was not implemented.
So the monument was left in limbo.
The city authorities saw no point in spending money from the local budget to maintain the building in proper condition when it had to be transferred to the National University anyway. And Mohyla had no right to do anything with the building because it did not acquire the right to use it until the Acceptance-Transfer Act was concluded in accordance with the lease agreement.
This period lasted for about 9 years, during which Mohyla patiently waited for the opportunity to receive the building without disrupting the hospital’s work. The only significant event during this time was changes in the lease agreement due to the transfer in 1999 of the monument along with the entire State Historical and Architectural Reserve “Ancient Kyiv” to the newly created Kyiv Scientific and Methodological Center for the protection, restoration, and use of historical, cultural, and reserve territories.
Bratski cells, photo: Heorhyi Mohylnyi‘s Facebook page
In July 2002, under the chairmanship of Oleksandr Omelchenko, the Bratski Cells were finally transferred by the Acceptance-Transfer Act. But not to Mohyla, with which the lease agreement was signed, but to Clinical Hospital No. 15 (!).
Three years later, the buildings of the Bratski Cells appear on paper as two separate entities.
The “first” building of the Bratski Cells, as a monument of national importance, remains unchanged in the operational management of the specialized communal structure responsible for the State Historical and Architectural Reserve “Ancient Kyiv.”
The “second” building, without any mention of the monument status or agreements with the Ministry of Culture, is transferred by Order of the Main Department of Municipal Property of Kyiv No. 41 of 04.02.2005 to the operational management of Clinical Hospital No. 15 as an average administrative building without preservation obligations.
Bratski cells, photo: kvit.ukma.edu.ua
The aforementioned decree of the President of Ukraine in 2008 did not solve the problem. But thanks to the attempts to implement it, the city authorities’ machinations with the building in previous years became known, so the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy began to defend its rights in court.
The Kyiv city authorities did everything possible to prevent Mohyla from obtaining the building. For example, after the lawsuit to cancel the transfer of the hospital’s “administrative building,” they canceled the transfer of the monument to the Kyiv Scientific and Methodological Center in 1999 to delay the case and supposedly correct the violation. As a result, only that case reached consideration in the Higher Administrative Court in December 2011.
After three years of legal battles on several cases, on May 16, 2012, Mohyla finally received a decision from the Kyiv Appellate Economic Court, which obliged the city authorities to actually transfer the Bratski Cells building to it.
And all these 10 years, when the city authorities already had clear plans for further use of the monument, it simply fell into disrepair. Therefore, there are all reasons to assert that during this period of time, it was deliberately brought to ruin.
Just a few weeks after Mohyla gained access to the building, a meeting of the Standing Committee on Technogenic and Environmental Safety and Emergency Situations of the Kyiv City State Administration was initiated.
The condition of the building was not just poor – according to the Commission’s survey, the situation had to be classified as “an extraordinary technogenic situation” of the local level “an extraordinary consequence of the destruction of a non-residential building or structure.”
In simple terms, the monument building could collapse at any moment if a series of urgent works were not carried out.
Minutes of the meeting of the Standing Committee on Technogenic and Environmental Safety and Emergency Situations regarding the condition of the Bratski Cells building.
The local authorities were unwilling to save the monument of communal property, which they themselves brought to ruin. And the state authorities were unwilling to save the monument of national significance, although they had been supposed to monitor its condition all these years and prevent its deterioration.
Mohyla didn’t wait for budget funding and rushed to save the building.
As early as July 2012, the Ministry of Culture approved the restoration task, after which emergency repair works began. According to Mohyla, these works were carried out using private donor funds from a Ukrainian philanthropist.
These works, as well as the restoration of part of the premises, were funded adequately, and everything else was preserved to prevent further deterioration and await future restoration.
Considering that it was definitely not the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy that brought the monument to such a state, which is currently conducting restoration work there, political speculation and attacks from the pro-government party, drone flights over Mohyla, and fines appear particularly cynical. Ukraine’s leading university emphasizes that these works are also being carried out with private donor funds.
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