The uncompleted Zenit Arena in St. Petersburg has once again hit a familiar roadblock in both construction and corruption.
The old Kirov Stadium on Krestovsky Island was demolished the best part of a decade ago and the forecasts were that the new stadium, based on the old site, would be opened by 2009. However, thanks to numerous delays ranging from design flaws to monetary issues, we may now not see the stadium be ready in time for the fast-approaching 2017 Confederations Cup.
Despite officials insisting that everything was and still is under control, it seems that the this project has taken yet another step backwards.
The construction of the Zenit Arena has already gone way over budget. The initial costs of the building process were estimated at 4.3 billion rubles (over €62m) but that have now increased by almost ten-fold to just under 40 billion (over €582m). This out-of-control expenditure is still only likely to increase after recent revelations.
Workers on the stadium test the vibration of the pitch.
FIFA sent a taskforce to St. Petersburg back in early November to check on the progress (or lack-of) on the stadium and found numerous problems. One of these was the pitch, which FIFA said ‘vibrates too much’. Yes you read that right, the pitch vibrates. Seven times too much for FIFA’s liking in fact.
The reason for this is in the design of the stadium. Zenit Arena has been designed not only to host football matches but also to host various other cultural events such as pop concerts. As a consequence it has been decided that the pitch should be retractable from the stadium in order to allow the grass to be saved whilst these other events to take place.
This is not a completely unique design and has been done before in several places including at the Veltins Arena – home of German club Schalke 04.
An engineer at Zenit Arena, said on Instagram that the problem is to do with the airbags under the pitch. The airbags are designed to take the pressure off the rollers which transport the turf to and from the venue and it could be the placement of these airbags is wrong.
The local authorities have assured FIFA that the problem will be resolved quickly and have looked to calm fears over the stadium. Russian Football Union President, Vitaly Mutko, has said that the situation is ‘normal’ and that he is confident that the stadium will meet its deadline in December.
Additionally, the Chairman of Russia’s Federation Council commission for preparations for the 2018 World Cup, Vadim Tyulpanov, has said that the Zenit Arena has now ‘moved out of FIFA’s red-zone and into the yellow-zone’.
FIFA officials are due back at the stadium site by December 20th and if the stadium is not ready by then then we could see serious sanctions imposed on St. Petersburg as a host city of the Confederations Cup next summer, where the stadium is planned to host the final.
Mutko and Tyulpanov’s brave public faces are not fooling anybody. This is a real crisis which could see the cultural capital of Russia stripped of its hosting rights.
The mere design of the stadium however is not where the controversy ends as there have once again been corruption allegations aimed at senior officials involved with the building of the arena.
Russian media recently reported that Marat Oganesyan, who was involved in the reconstruction of the world famous Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow and the construction of the newly-built Marinsky Theatre 2 in St. Petersburg, is being charged with fraud in relation to his role in the Krestovsky Island project.
Marat Oganesyan is the latest official to be charged of corruption relating to the Zenit Arena.
Oganesyan had been involved in the construction process since March 2013 and at that time promised the stadium would be ready by October 2015. However, just a few months after making that statement, construction once again fell behind.
He unexpectedly resigned from his position in April 2015, despite having signed numerous contracts regarding the construction of the stadium just a year or so beforehand. However, Oganesyan was still apparently involved and it has been reported that he has been helping to oversee the construction of the stadium after all, despite the fact that during this summer he said he was merely advising. Quite messy.
The Chisnau-born construction guru has now been arrested after being accused of illegally employing joint-stock company ‘TDM’ as a subcontractor to work on the stadium before asking them to advance him more than 50 million rubles via illegal means. That 50 million was supposed to go on the construction of a big screen in the stadium.
Marat Oganesyan is known as a construction guru in Russia. The new Marinsky 2 Theatre in St. Petersburg (above) is just one of the projects he has undertaken.
Vitaly Lazutkin, the CEO of the now-banished construction company Inzhtransstroi-SPB, confirmed that a payment of 50 million rubles he had given to TDM for the big screen had gone missing
Whilst these latest revelations are shocking, they are not entirely surprising.
This is a project which has been beset by corruption ever since the planning stage and this latest news is just another can of petrol thrown onto the out-of-control fire that is the Zenit Arena.
Whether Oganesyan is guilty or not, it makes no difference. The problems at the stadium are not entirely down to him and indeed the work should have been completed years before his arrival. This is just another small part of what has been the huge problem of St. Petersburg’s World Cup preparations.
Follow Thomas on Twitter: @Thomas_Giles_UK