British journalists have conducted their own investigation into Ukrainian factory producing artificial turf for football pitches and assumed that former FFU leaders could benefit from the campaign discrediting current FFU management.

On November 14th, in famous St.Albance Center in London “Muddy Waters” documentary about work of the FFU and artificial turf factory was presented. Journalist Oliver Regan had a chance to evaluate the work of the factory, analyse the documents showed by the FFU and talk to foreign partners of the Ukrainian enterprise.

The FFU President Andrii Pavelko denied the accusations of embezzlement while building the factory. It was explained why and how a company from the United Arab Emirates got involved in the project.

 “During our negotiations the company in the United Arab Emirates was proposed by Polytan. (world-known manufacturer of artificial turf for football pitches – ed.) Troubles concerning the geographical location and logistics of the suppliers I mean UK, Denmark, United States… So we had an official letter from Polytan that this very company is recommended for us to fulfil the whole project of the creation of the artificial pitches factory.” – the FFU General Secretary Yurii Zapisotskyi told to the British journalists.

Also, Andrii Pavelko denied the information that any grant money from UEFA was used for creating the factory.

 “No money from HatTrick program (UEFA’s grant program supporting children’s football – ed.) was used for the FFU artificial turf factory. Because money from this HatTrick program is allocated by UEFA for specific projects. It is a separate program and separate financing. Separately we have our own incomes from selling TV rights, and not UEFA, but the FFU and its acting executive committee decide what to do with this money” – the FFU President informed the investigative journalists of “Muddy Waters”.

Andrii Pavelko reminded the British journalists that he had hired international auditing companies from the so called big four accounting firms - KPMG and Ernst & Young to audit the FFU. Obviously having such openness, any corrupt schemes would have been noticed even without journalists being involved.

After inviting to the FFU and showing the documents that denied the accusations, Pavelko told the authors of the “Muddy Waters” documentary, that he “knows this person” running a campaign discrediting him. “If someone was interested in getting material benefits, there would be no need to come up with complicated tasks...  But this isn’t my goal, because I was a successful businessman even before joining Parliament. Now I am a member of Parliament, and one of my ambitions is to make sure that our Ukrainian generation is healthy, and that we are as successful in sport as possible.” – Pavelko told to the British journalist.

 “Muddy Waters” documentary analyses what caused this huge information campaign allegedly revealing corruption in the FFU. Virtually, this campaign aiming to find corruption in Pavelko’s ruling is paid for, because no one asked him to show documents or give his comments. Possible reason – coming elections of the UEFA Executive Committee, where Andrii Pavelko, and not current UEFA vice-president Hryhorii Surkis was nominated.