“You won’t see his name anywhere on this construction site, but it is Prigojine who is behind this project. Between its constructions and those of Gazprom, the only park in the area is visibly shrinking”, regrets a local resident Primorsky, in Saint Petersburg. The building it designates was built at the foot of the gas giant’s gigantic skyscraper, on the shores of the Gulf of Finland. A few months ago, the building permit announced a “nautical base”, the only infrastructure permitted by law in this park. These are ultimately luxury apartments that have emerged under the nose and beard of the mayor of Saint Petersburg. And for good reason: the head of the Wagner militia, Evgueni Prigojine, who on Saturday May 20 claimed the complete capture of Bakhmout, is, de facto, the bis mayor of the city of Saint Petersburg. King of real estate, the businessman also feeds school children in the canteen, owns renowned restaurants and provides a catering service in international forums organized locally by Vladimir Putin.
Since last November, he has set up a headquarters not far from the city center in the name of his militia, making Wagner a brand like any other. In this large glass building, Prigojine housed a start-up incubator, which he finances. Hosted companies must offer innovative technologies, which can then be useful to its mercenaries. He also created an open space to accommodate media and Telegram channels responsible for disseminating propaganda and disinformation about the war to a Russian-speaking public. Enough to complete its influence system, already embodied by another building, located on the outskirts of Saint Petersburg. The Internet Research Agency is a gigantic “troll factory”, in which hundreds of employees write comments in several languages published on Western social networks. To enter, you have to show your credentials and go through a lie detector.
A cardboard-paste Versailles
Not far away, the sulphurous entrepreneur has brought an entire neighborhood out of the ground. Her name ? “The Versailles of the North”. Strange, when you know how much he hates Europe, where he can no longer set foot since the sanctions taken against him in 2020. And too bad if his project includes municipal roads that he privatized without authorization. Or if other townspeople can no longer get to the lake in the area, with security ensuring that no one enters the housing estate. In these large houses with a very kitsch style, a sort of cardboard Versailles, the one who is said to be close to Vladimir Putin has put his family to safety. Is it in this enclosure that his daughter, accustomed to Belgian riding competitions, and his son live, who claimed to have signed up with Wagner, photo in support of his forehead, when he is actually running a golden youth in St. Petersburg? Mystery.
One thing is certain, it is in the second city of the country that Prigojine installed the matrix of his empire of some 400 companies, starting from scratch. In the 1990s, upon his release from prison, he launched into hot dogs and pancakes to take away. Plunged into a savage capitalism, Russia gives the means to the smartest to get out of it. In 1993, he opened a restaurant on the banks of the Neva. Initially conceived as a striptease bar, this address became an essential place for the Russian elite. The businessman realizes that he is in luck and creates several restaurants of this type, including the New Island, houseboat located opposite the headquarters of Concord, the parent company of all its businesses. Jacques Chirac or George Bush went there in the 2000s.
Arm wrestling with the governor of Saint Petersburg
A few years ago, Wagner’s chef obtained the privatization of the city’s most touristic restaurant, Eliseev, located on its main artery, the famous Nevsky prospect. This one is registered in the name of his wife, as is the tourist chocolate museum. But relations with the governor of Saint Petersburg, Alexander Beglov, deteriorated. For more than two years, Evgueni Prigojine has been attacking this leader on a daily basis, via his numerous media, whose resignation he continues to call.
In an almost confusing way, he explained publicly last winter that he had financed the governor’s last campaign in 2019 to the tune of 2.4 billion rubles (over 28 million euros) and had not received the change. of his room. Namely, the management of snow removal and the evacuation of waste from the city. And, above all, building permits to develop his real estate empire.
Tired of suffering the daily wrath of the media and “trolls” under orders, Beglov tries to resist by regularly blocking certain building permits filed with the town hall. But Prigojine has contacts in high places and now enjoys a political aura. If the Kremlin is, most certainly, annoyed by its daily outings on the army, it still needs this militia renowned for its expeditious methods. A scenario is circulating: what if, to “calm him down”, Vladimir Putin decides to place him at the head of the Saint Petersburg region?