About readiness to head again the gold-mining company Petropavlovsk Pavel Maslovsky told Forbes. "I was offered [to lead Petropavlovsk], I agreed," he said. "Now the voting of the shareholders will show that it will be June 29". In case of a positive decision, according to the entrepreneur, he intends to finish those programs that have already been started, but are being implemented by the current board of directors "with less success". This is, in particular, about autoclave production. "To follow the same path, but with a greater understanding of what you are doing," concluded Maslovsky.

The decision of the founder of the company was a response to an open letter from employees of Petropavlovsk to the board of directors of the group that is experiencing a protracted corporate conflict. They asked to replace the members of the company's board, returning to him, in addition to Maslovsky, former independent directors Robert Jenkins and Roderick Lain. A month ago, two shareholders Petropavlovsk made the same demands: offshore CABS Platform and Slevin (own 9.11%).

Maslovsky decided to withdraw from the board and from the post of general director of the gold mining company in mid-2017, following his long-time partner and co-founder Petropavlovsk, Peter Hambro. At the same time, the ex-senator from the Amur Region spoke about the intention to retain a stake in the company, which was previously estimated at 5.81%. Co-founders of Petropavlovsk left the company as a result of a conflict with the Renova group of Viktor Vekselberg. The fact that Renova became a major shareholder in the gold miner, it became known in November 2015. Together with the friendly investment funds of the Sothic Capital European Opportunities Master Fund Limited and M & G Debt Opportunities Fund II, the Renova structure of Renova Asset Holding owned about 47% of Petropavlovsk shares by June 2017. At the same time, Renova managed to introduce its representatives to the board of directors of Petropavlovsk, which led to the resignation of Peter Hambro, who described the actions of Vekselberg's structures as "secret seizure".

Vekselberg had big plans for Petropavlovsk: he wanted to merge the company with his "Gold of Kamchatka", and then with some of the big gold miners (for example, with "Amur Gold" by Musa Bazhayev or Highlang Gold Roman Abramovich and partners). But at the end of 2017, Renova sold its stake in Petropavlovsk to Fincraft Holding of Kazakhstan businessman Kenes Rakishev. Bektas Mukazhanov began to represent Rakishev's interests in Petropavlovsk's directors.

With the emergence of a new shareholder, the corporate conflict broke out even more. When in May of this year Slevin and CABS Platform offered to return Maslovsky to the company, Rakishev stated that he was ready to support this proposal. However, the board of directors of Petropavlovsk strongly opposed, and also proposed to exclude Mukazhanov from its structure, since it had a conflict of interests. "The reaction of the board of directors, in my opinion, is completely unconstructive. There is a feeling that instead of focusing on business development and solving current corporate problems, they mostly put personal interests at the center of the development, developing a corporate conflict, "Rakishev said.

In a recent letter from the company's employees, the text of which is quoted by Interfax, it is asserted that Petropavlovsk has been deprived of strategic leadership during the past year, and all operational tasks are solved "mainly by inertia". "Now the inertia is running out, the company is losing valuable personnel, and in our opinion, the situation is approaching the crisis," affirms the letter, signed by more than 50 people, including CEO of Petropavlovsk Management Company Sergei Ermolenko.

Whose interests represent the company CABS Platform and Slevin, it is not known - their beneficiaries are not disclosed. But their shareholding corresponds to the fact that as of December 31, 2017 was on the balance sheet of the Asia-Pacific Bank (co-owners through the VMHY holding were Maslovsky, Khambro and banker Andrey Vdovin). The package was actually put into the bank, while the company Vailaski Holding, representing the interests of Maslovsky, Hambro and Vdovin, had an option to buy them. But the option was never implemented, sources of Kommersant said, and the package was sold "to the market."

As of March 27, 2018, the largest shareholders of Petropavlovsk were Fincraft (20.17%), Sothis Capital (10.96%), Slevin Ltd (9.11%), VTB Bank AG (9.08%), D.E. Shaw (7.77%), M & G / Prudential (6.82%). Market capitalization of the group Petropavlovsk on the stock exchange in London is today about £ 221 million.