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“I want to go home, but I have no money and I don’t know what I will do”
Gennadiy Gavrylov seen at the Hulftsdorp court premises
More than five years after being arrested while at the helm of MV Avant Garde, Ukrainian ship captain Gennadiy Gavrylov is free to go home.
But he has no job, no money and it will cost thousands of dollars to renew his paperwork at a time when the world is fighting a crippling pandemic.
“I want to go home,” Mr Gavrylov, 54, told the Sunday Times, which also interviewed him in June 2019. “But I still don’t understand how it is possible to arrest innocent people. I did nothing illegal and this was understood from the first day. When I was in prison, they asked me why only I am inside. But what could I do against what the prosecutor wanted?”
Mr Gavrylov spent ten months in remand prison. His passport was later returned to him but his bail conditions prevented him from leaving. He petitioned the Supreme Court against his treatment.
Finally, on May 21, the Colombo High Court Trial-at-Bar unanimously acquitted Avant Garde Chairman Nissanka Senadhipathi and six others–including Mr Gavrylov–saying the floating armoury in the Red Sea maintained by Avant Garde and Rakna Lanka was completely legal.
The High Court judgment observes that, merely by virtue of holding a legal contract with a shipping company to captain the MV Avant Garde, Mr Gavrylov was remanded, prevented from returning to his country and had to undergo a heart operation without the presence of his family. The Court said this calls for a reevaluation of the Sri Lankan justice system.
“This was a good experience for me,” said Mr Gavrylov, who speaks heavily-accented English. “Now I know what I will do next time.”
But he showed little amusement about his future. He had hoped to see his aged mother, who was born in 1937 and was paralysed after a stroke. But she died in June last year. He once earned US$8,000 a month as a ship’s captain. Since 2015, he has survived on a small allowance from a benefactor.
“I don’t have money,” he said. “I don’t know what I will do. My documents must be renewed every five years but they expired while I am here and I don’t know how much it will cost now. Usually, it’s big money. Ukraine is also not in a good situation now. With the pandemic, the economy has gone down.”
Sri Lankan people are good, Mr Gavrylov said: “The country is also very good. But politics, I don’t know. I sent many letters to the previous President and Prime Minister but I did not get a reply.”
Back home, Mr Gavrylov has two adult sons. One is an IT professional, the other is shipping. Gennadiy’s father was a chief engineer on civil ships. His mother was a teacher. He started his job in 1987. He first worked as a seaman, then motorman, engineer, navigator and ship’s captain. He climbed the ladder step-by-step.
In August 2017, Mr Gavrylov collapsed at the Supreme Court where his fundamental rights petition was being examined. Tests showed he had serious heart ailments. “It was a problem that began in prison,” he said.
Being locked up was a shock to him. He shared his cell with a Bulgarian. “I felt very sad, very bad,” Mr Gavrylov reflected. “It was always closed and we needed permission to go outside. I had to sleep on the floor with a mattress.”
It was found Mr Gavrylov suffered triple vessel disease. In 2019, he finally had heart surgery after hesitating over the absence of his family. “Think how you will feel if you go to another country and they cut you open,” he said at the time. “Whether you will live or not is a big question.”