Ukrainian Canadian Mykhailo Halandiuk Donates Five Million to Charity

This story has impressed many people, and not just those who live in Ukraine.

Fate decreed that Mykhailo Halandiuk, an ethnic Ukrainian born in 1904 in the Lviv region, would settle after the war in a distant, alien land. Nothing special distinguished him from other Canadian citizens. True, he had a strange hobby: he played the lottery. One time he won seven million dollars. What would the average person have done in this case? He would have bought either a house, or a car, or something else, and lived in clover. But, instead, the exceptionally modest Halandiuk made a will whose princely largess impressed many. The will stated that all the funds he had left should be distributed as follows:

$1,100,000 CAN to the Canada-based Children of Chornobyl Foundation for the Nadiya (Hope) project;

$935,000 to the Ukrainian Youth Association of Canada (SUM) and Veselka (Rainbow) House;

$275,000 to the senior citizens’ home at St. Dmytro’s parish in Toronto;

$275,000 to the patriarchal cathedral in Kyiv;

$275,000 to St. Michael’s Golden-Domed Cathedral in the capital of Ukraine;

$275,000 to the Ucrainica Research Institute;

$275,000 to Lviv’s hospitals;

$275,000 for publishing school books in Ukraine;

$275,000 to fund a Department of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Alberta in Edmonton;

$275,000 to the Church of St. Mary the Protectress in the village of Hai, Brody district, Lviv oblast;

$165,000 to the Church of St. Mary the Protectress in Toronto;

$120,000 to publish books on Symon Petliura;

$80,000 dollars to the Homin Ukrainy weekly.

The Toronto-based lawyer Yaroslav Botiuk and the chief executive of Buduchnist Credit Union Oksana Protsiuk-Chyzh were appointed the executors of Mr. Halandiuk’s will.

His Holiness Patriarch Filaret instructed Mykhailo Slaboshpytsky, executive director of the League of Ukrainian Art Patrons, to execute Mr. Halandiuk’s will in respect of St. Michael’s Golden-Domed Cathedral. The executor commented on this story:

“It took seven years to execute the will. Although the matter looks very simple at first glance, it contained some objective and subjective factors that complicated it. There was also what I would call underwater currents. But, finally, everything was done after the court issued its ruling. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank lawyer Yevhen Zalutsky and the [other] executor of the will. Thanks to their goodwill and energetic efforts, this matter ended successfully. They undoubtedly deserve many fine words of gratitude.”