Rivne media offered money for publishing an investigation into a minister

Rivne media received letters from "Limeo Agency", which claimed to be a marketing agency, with an offer to publish the Slidstvo.Info investigation into the Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food, Vitaliy Koval, for money. The head of Slidstvo.info, Anna Babinets, believes that such letters are intended to frame the agency's investigation as commissioned, reports the Institute of Mass Information representative in Rivne oblast, who spoke with the editors of "Horyn.Info" and "Rivne Media" and Anna Babinets.

A search online, in state registers and on social media yields no information about "Limeo Agency", notes the IMI representative, who tried to find information about this "agency".

In the emails received by the media outlets, the "agency" writes that it is processing "a commission to release commercial material of a sensitive nature in Rivne oblast's prominent media."

In the Slidstvo.Info investigation in question, the journalists discuss the premium-class apartment in which Vitaliy Koval lives. "This apartment belongs to his mother-in-law, who, it seems, had no official income to purchase it. The housing could cost 17.7 million hryvnias, and was purchased when Vitaliy Koval was the head of the Rivne Oblast Administration," Slidstvo.Info says in the investigation.

As the IMI representative was told by the Horyn.info and Rivne Media editors, both news outlets received emails on September 24, after the Slidstvo.Info investigation was published on their websites. The editors of both websites declined the "agency's" offer.

The sender offers the media outlets to name the price for posting the investigation themselves and receive the money on their credit cards or bank accounts. Screenshot of the email received by Horyn.Info

"I consider the message we received almost two hours after the news was published to be an attempt to smear our team and, above all, the Slidstvo.Info investigation," said Inna Denysiuk, the acting editor-in-chief of Horyn.info.

The email offering money for sharing the investigation received by Rivne Media. Screenshot shared by Rivne Media

The Rivne Telegram channel "Stierlitz" reported a similar offer of money for posting the investigation.

The Telegram channel "Stierlitz" also refused to post the investigation for money. Screenshot from Stierlitz by the IMI

The "Slidstvo.info" chief editor Anna Babinets notes that these emails are not the first incident related to the agency's investigation about Vitaliy Koval. On September 24, Babinets reported on Facebook that after the investigation into Koval's apartment was released, the Slidstvo.Info website suffered a DDoS attack.

In the comment to the IMI representative, Anna Babinets noted that such letters are intended to frame the investigation as commissioned.

"There have been various attempts to discredit Slidstvo.Info throughout the 12 years of its existence, but this is something truly exotic. First, a DDoS attack on the site immediately after the release of the investigation about Minister Koval. And now the emails, which are probably intended to make our investigation look commissioned. We at Slidstvo.Info have never and will never make any commercial materials. Such actions once again prove to me that we are working and digging in the right direction," said Anna Babinets in her comment to the IMI representative.