It appears that Yanukovych had been living with a 39-year-old girlfriend, Lyubov Polezhay, according to journalist
Dmytro Gnap who has been exploring the sprawling 140-hectare Mezhyhirya complex
since Yanukovych abandoned it early on Feb. 22. The relationship appears to have been a long-term one, but it was also a relationship that Yanukovych kept hidden from the public.
Yanukovych never divorced Liudmyla
Yanukovych, 64, whom he married in 1972. But it’s been well-known that she lives
in Donetsk and has never performed duties of a first lady, although she
accompanied Yanukovych several times during his 2010 campaign. ”She is very
negative about politics,” Yanukovych once said.
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It is unclear how long
Polezhay has been living with Yanukovych. According to her Facebook page,
Polezhay grew up in Yenakievo, Yanukovych’s hometown, and moved to Donetsk
after graduating from high school in 1992. Polezhay owns the Crystal Spa salon in Kyiv’s Obolon
district and manages a “Road of Future” charity fund. Her business card was
found in Mezhyhirya, but the phone number is not working.
The woman evidently loves dogs
and owns a white Pomeranian spitz that was seen in the surveillance camera’s
footage of Yanukovych leaving Mezhyhirya.
She actively updated her
Facebook page until Feb. 18, but mostly with reposted pictures of dogs and
flowers. One of the photos she uploaded herself shows a part of the room where
decorations and design matches one of the photographed bedrooms in Mezhyhirya.
However, she deleted her
Facebook page about 2:30 p.m. on Feb. 24, as well as her profile on Vkontakte,
the Russian version of Facebook.
Polezhay’s daughter from a previous
relationship, a 12-year-old girl, was living in Mezhyhirya too. Her documents
were found in what appears to be the girl’s bedroom, decorated with white
barocco furniture and plenty of stuffed toys. According to the documents, the girl
studies in Pechersk School International Kyiv, an expensive private school
where many diplomats’ children study.
The girl’s Facebook page has
photos with her classmates, including former President Viktor Yushchenko’s daughter. The son and daughter of the European Union ambassador to Ukraine
and the granddaughter of popular singer Sofia Rotaru are also among the girl’s
Facebook friends. Many of her classmates have black squares with
blue-and-yellow ribbons for profile pictures – the mark of EuroMaidan
supporters.
Gnap published a photo of a
drawing by the girl that pictured her “special people” and had the girl hugging
her mom and a man signed as “V.F.”, the initials for Viktor Fyodorovych,
Yanukovych’s name and patronymic.
Yanukovych met his wife
Liudmyla Yanukovych in 1969. The next year he was imprisoned again for beating
up a man and spent another two years in prison.
“She waited for me,” said
Yanukovych in an interview in 2009. “I was released in 1972, and two months
after that we got married.”
Now Liudmyla Yanukovych is
known to live quiet life in Donetsk. She is a religious woman and is very fond
of theater. Last year a journalist met her at a theater premier in Donetsk and
asked how Yanukovych had greeted her on her most recent birthday. Yanukovych
gave her a call and asked how she was doing, she said.
According
to the website of Ukrainian Orthodox Church, in May of 2013 Polezhay was
granted the order of Saint Princess Olga for her help in constructing a
cathedral in Pereyaslav-Khmelnitskiy.
Kyiv Post lifestyle editor Olga Rudenko can be reached at rudenko@kyivpost.com.
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