It includes gold mines, arms trading, a mercenary force and a drug business. Pavel Prigozhin is running a business empire worth hundreds of millions of dollars a year, and he is only 28 years of age. He oversees around 500 mercenaries from Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic.
After his father’s death, Pavel travelled to Bangui to meet Dmitry Sytii, a former confidant of Yevgeny, and Denis Suprunov, Wagner’s local military commander. He helped bring Wagner mercenaries into the country’s police, army and intelligence services. Wagner has also entered the drinks business. It sells vodka called Wa Wa Wa, or Fire and Fire, and beer called Africa Ti L’Or, meaning Africa is Gold.
He took over the empire after the death of his father, Yevgeny Prigozhin, the former head of the Wagner Group, in a private jet crash in Russia in August 2023. Pavel was only 25 at the time.
He also held meetings with senior government officials, according to researchers and security officials. The group also controls much of the local market for tramadol, a prescription opioid, according to the report.
Pavel was known for his lavish lifestyle from a young age. The family business, which includes legal and criminal activities, generates more than $400 million a year, according to estimates by the Geneva-based Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime. When Pavel turned 20, Yevgeny put him in charge of the family’s luxury villas and apartment buildings, researchers said.
Photos shared on social media showed him aboard private jets and on the family’s luxury yacht, according to the Anti-Corruption Foundation, a non-profit linked to late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Yevgeny, who had two other children, considered Pavel his successor, according to investigative group All Eyes on Wagner.
