In a bid to pass himself off to the domestic and international public – but above all, to the foreign business circles – as a no-nonsense businessman, the controversial Serbian billionaire Dragan Šolak appears to have commissioned a series of articles which put him neck and neck with the global business elite. In a series of what were likely commissioned pieces, United Group's owner puts himself in the company of Roman Abramovich and Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed, as well as the owner of the Denver Nuggets – featuring the best MVP player in the world, our very own Nikola Jokić – and even the owner of Red Bull, a living business visionary, Dietrich Mateschitz.
Open-and-shut attempt at rebranding
Convinced that a few articles can help him hide the dark secrets from his past, Šolak put his well-oiled media mechanism in motion in order to create for the general public a false image of himself as a man who has achieved the American Dream in the Balkans.
Specifically, in an article published in his print edition Nova, United Group's owner compares himself to Roman Abramovich, Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed, owner of the Denver Nuggets Stan Kroenke, which Nikola Jokić plays for, and so forth. In this commissioned PR pamphlet, Šolak claims that by purchasing an 80-percent stake in the Premier League Southampton FC, he has reached the very pinnacle of the global business jet set, like many successful people who have expanded their business to include sports.
Almost at the same time, pieces with a similar content and an identical main theme appeared in the Croatian daily Jutarnji. In this daily, the owner of United Group – who, according to our information, happens to also be its future owner – passes himself off as someone who follows in the successful footsteps of the owner of Red Bull, Dietrich Mateschitz (!), as well as a prominent champion of democracy in Serbia since the days of Slobodan Milošević, even though no one had heard of him in Serbia back in the day. Šolak paints a picture of the time when he was smuggling and selling pirated music and film tapes and discs as a visionary struggle for democracy and the free market, in which he would go on to achieve his business ideas.
Jumping on the Nova and Jutarnji bandwagon, the Radio Free Europe portal published an op-ed by Adnan Čomor, putting the United Group owner among the most successful owners of the best football clubs in Europe. In doing so, the op-ed fully ignores Dragan Šolak's biography, which could more likely put him among the many fraudsters and speculators buying clubs for highly suspect or sports-unrelated reasons.
Red Bull
- Transparent structure
- Owner with a vision
- Success in a free market competition
- Socially responsible company
- Business fully compliant with the law
United Group
- Hidden ownership
- Tycoon owner
- Success only through ties and blackmails
- Abuse of public resources and public interest
- Sidestepping and violating the regulations wherever possible
Distasteful comparisons
Comparing himself to Red Bull's owner Dietrich Mateschitz, Dragan Šolak equates the edge of the stratosphere (38,969m) – from which Felix Baumgartner jumped under the sponsorship of Red Bull – and the height of the Belgrade roofs, from which Šolak had been lassoing cables that brought him a billion and three hundred million euro's worth of capital.
Given the history of his business operations and the intentions behind buying a Premier League club, and in light of the fact that he himself confirmed that he had no plans to throw more money at the development of the club, one could say that Šolak is closer to the life and work of Bernard Tapie. Tapie, who used to own Adidas and the Olympique de Marseille football club, served time in prison as a result of numerous corruption scandals.
The Nova daily has put Šolak side by side with Abramovich and Sheikh bin Zayed, but he belongs more in the company of the owners of the clubs that have been put under arrest, such as Bernard Tapie and Jesús Gil
Tapie was at the helm of the famous French football club between 1986 and 1994. In 1993, the club won the Champions League, and later that year Tapie was accused of fixing the match against Valenciennes FC and subsequently convicted. In May 1995, he was sentenced to two years and two months in prison for rigging the match and financial fraud, but was given a conditional release after serving six months.
The second case that Dragan Šolak is much closer to than the respectable, world-renowned businesspeople is the case of the former owner of the football club Atlético de Madrid, Jesús Gil. Following numerous machinations, Gil was incarcerated twice – first because of business, and then because of football. Although Gill was a football enthusiast – which isn't exactly the case when it comes to the Serbian golf lover – that didn't stop him from using this sport as a smokescreen to be breaking the regulations.
Exposing the true intentions
As Kurir has reported before, Šolak built his business by breaking any and all regulations out there, with the support of the funds controlled by George Soros. For example, in taking over Serbian cities, United Group's owner illegally used the sewage systems of Belgrade Heating Plants and street light poles, installed his cables in residential buildings against the will of the tenants, and stole their electricity for the purposes of operating his network.
At the same time, with the help of the political structures of the former regime and the administrators and regulatory body officials on backhanders, Šolak skilfully sidestepped the laws and regulations. In this way, he was destroying the Serbian Telekom, which he was defeated by in a free-market competition and cannot accept this fact to the present day.
This is precisely the reason why Šolak has gone into sports by purchasing Southampton FC. It is no accident that the club was one of the 20 co-owners of the English Premier League, whose rights to show matches Šolak's Sport Klub recently lost after a full 12 years of a monopolistic position, during which time he'd had this content firmly in his grasp.
As Kurir has previously reported, the controversial Serbian billionaire intends to become a co-owner of the Premier League through the club in question and so get a vote in the association of the most powerful English clubs. He aims to use this position to lobby and pressure the Premier League management in order to cancel the agreement with Telekom.
The Kurir Team
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