Former Russian citizen Olga Borodina, who was taken by the ex-head of the Naftogaz of Ukraine national joint-stock company Andrii Kobolev as the director of procurement of the group of companies, sued the company almost UAH 8 million during the war.
This is evidenced by the materials of the Shevchenkivskyi District Court of Kyiv, Ukrainian News Agency reports.
According to the case materials, in mid-March 2021, then chairman of the board of Naftogaz, Andrii Kobolev, concluded an employment contract with Borodina until February 25, 2024. She was appointed director of procurement at Naftogaz Group.
Before working at Naftogaz, Borodina worked at Royal Dutch Shell and Shell Sahalin, and had Dutch citizenship.
After the beginning of the large-scale military invasion of the Russian Federation in Ukraine and the missile attacks on Kyiv, namely on March 1, 2022, Borodina left for the Netherlands and continued to work remotely.
On April 14, 2022, Naftogaz of Ukraine suspended the contract with Borodina for the period of martial law.
Naftogaz also refused to count the salary, guaranteed and compensatory payments to Borodinia from April 15, 2022 until the date of renewal of the contract.
According to the contract, before the war, Naftogaz compensated Borodinia USD 3,000 per month for renting an apartment.
In June 2022, Borodina filed a lawsuit against Naftogaz for reimbursement.
In her opinion, Naftogaz of Ukraine grossly violated labor rights and legitimate property interests.
In court, a representative of Naftogaz explained that the company had no opportunity to provide Borodina with a job in connection with the military aggression against Ukraine.
The Shevchenkivskyi court noted that the provisions of the Convention of the International Labor Organization No. 158 of June 22, 1982 state that "the employer cannot act arbitrarily, at his own discretion, determining both the grounds and the procedure for dismissal."
The court also found that ex-chairman of the board of Naftogaz Yurii Vitrenko sent a memo to Borodina to come to her workplace on April 4 "due to production necessity."
"The defendant, on the one hand, claims the impossibility of providing the plaintiff with work, and on the other hand, calls her at his own location to continue the work," the court decision states.
The court came to the conclusion of gross violation of Borodina's labor rights by Naftogaz and annulled the order on the suspension of the employment contract and decided to immediately collect from the state company in favor of the woman the amount of monthly earnings during the forced termination of the employment contract.
At the same time, Naftogaz sent a statement to the court to postpone the execution of the court decision, attaching information that Borodina is a citizen of Russia.
Naftogaz made this conclusion based on the letter of the Foreign Intelligence Service of Ukraine dated October 26, 2022.
Instead, Borodina's defense provided the court with documents regarding her renunciation of Russian citizenship.
The court found out that on June 25, 2020, Russian President Vladimir Putin stripped Borodina of Russian citizenship.
The judges examined the original certificate of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation on the resignation of Borodina from citizenship dated July 9, 2020.
The original act of voluntary handing over of foreign passports of the Russian Federation and the passport of a citizen of the Russian Federation, in the name of Olga Borodina, was also attached to the case.
In addition, the court noted that Borodina lived in Russia as a foreign citizen - a citizen of the Netherlands.
"Olga Borodina is a native of the city of Krasnoyarsk (Russian Federation). However, at the time of concluding the employment contract with the Naftogaz of Ukraine national joint-stock company, as well as at the time of consideration of the specified civil case, there is no evidence in the case file that she is a citizen of the Russian Federation, as he has the citizenship of the Kingdom of the Netherlands," the court emphasized.
For these reasons, the court rejected the application of Naftogaz of Ukraine to postpone the execution of the court decision.
Thus, Borodina sued UAH 7.7 million in average earnings during the forced termination of the employment contract, UAH 213,300 in court costs (of which UAH 200,000 were legal aid costs) and UAH 87,700 in unpaid compensation for renting an apartment in March 2022.
As Ukrainian News Agency earlier reported, Kobolev said that after he did not pay the full amount of the bail set by the court (UAH 229 million), the National Anti-Corruption Bureau submitted a new petition to the court - to take him into custody with the alternative of paying bail in the amount of UAH 365.7 million.
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