Claims that crews have not been paid
A Russian owner is facing industrial action following claims that crews have not been paid.
Union officials and commercial creditors are preparing to take action against vessels controlled by Monaco-based Russian commodities exporter and bulker owner Aleksei Fedoricsev.
The action is directly related to the mini-bulker fleet of Fedoricsev’s former Manati Navigation and follows a change of control of that fleet that critics say was a sham.
Muzzafer Civelek,who is Istanbul’s ITF representator,confirms that actions are being planned if former Manati seafarers are not paid this week.
Civelek mentions that this could take the form of boycotts and blacklisting or ship arrests in the jurisdiction where the former Manati ships trade.
Nearly 44 seafarers are said to be owed over $140,000 in unpaid wages after being discharged in connection with a series of transactions that culminated in April.
In one case, a chief engineer, Oleg Hairulin, who demanded some $52,515 in back pay on 30 March in connection with one ship handover, was allegedly dismissed on the spot and ordered confined on board his former ship, the 5,100-dwt Aleksandr Lebed (built 1985).
Instead of being repatriated in the ordinary manner, Hairulin was allegedly treated to an involuntary passage from Istanbul to Rostov-on-Don on his former ship and put on land with no means of getting home.
Vassilev Maritime of Istanbul also claims it is owed an undisputed $2.1m after a termination of fleet-management contracts. Ship-supply companies and other third-party creditors with claims against the Manati vessels are being referred by Vassilev to Fedoricsev and the ship’s new managers.
From January to April of this year, the Fedoricsev ships moved from the technical management of Vassilev Maritime to that of Kent Shipping & Trading, led by Sabahattin Su. Both are established Istanbul companies. Ownership shares of third-party manager Kent remain under Turkish control, while the single-ship companies that own the vessels are said to be new Fedoricsev entities, despite talk of a sale of the vessels to a Russian-based grain company outside the Fedcom group.
Vassilev managing director Todor Vassilev tells that his company has had to lay off most of its onshore staff in response to progressive cancellations of management contracts. Other shipowner customers have been lost after fees allegedly unpaid by Fedoricsev forced Vassilev to press the other clients for quicker settlement of outstanding accounts.
Vassilev has put his own shipowning ambitions involving a $400m order of river-sea bulker newbuildings on hold. He says he is considering options for the future of his business.
The crew-wage and shipmanager-fee disputes with Fedoricsev are said ultimately to be an effect of last summer’s Russian grain-export prohibition, which cost Manati about one-quarter of its cargoes and put Fedoricsev’s company under severe economic pressure before the ban was lifted.
Fedoricsev, whose name is also transliterated as Fedorychev, acquired his bulker fleet to complement his sulphur, fertiliser and grain-exporting activities through his Fedcominvest Monaco SAM and other arms of the Monaco-based Fedcom Group. He also has dry-bulk-terminal interests on the Black Sea.
The former Manati river-sea mini-bulkers with 13-man crews trade from the Black Sea to Spain, Italy, Romania, Turkey and the Middle East. But the planned ITF actions could target other Fedoricsev-controlled entities.
Other shipping companies linked to Fedoricsev include London-based Ocean Agencies Ltd, Odessa-based Unimor Shipping Agency and Greece’s Trinity Ship Management, all of which own or operate bulkers from handysize to panamax, including several supramax newbuildings, according to standard reference sources.
