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Trophies of the
anti-corruption
front
and what lessons they have learnt
anti-corruption
front
On the occasion of the International Anti-Corruption Day, on December 9, Transparency International Ukraine analyzed the achievements of the NABU, the SAPO, the NACP, the ARMA, and the HACC. We have pictured anticorruption institutions as knights, collected quantitative and qualitative “trophies” of each body and combined them with the results of our own study of capacity, management, and interaction of these institutions to identify to what extent the knights of the anti-corruption front are ready to continue fighting.
Learn more about this from our special project.
The knight actively interacts with the National Bank, the Anti-Monopoly Committee, the State Border Service, Tax and Customs Service.
However, other courts sometimes illegally interfere in NABU proceedings and try to change their jurisdiction, although detectives investigate cases that only HACC judges are to consider. For example, when the Pechersk District Court of Kyiv obliged the Prosecutor General to take the case from the NABU on suspicion of the head and judges of the Kyiv Administrative Court (KAC) and the State Judicial Administration (SJA) head, and refer it to another law enforcement agency.
It has evolved from a law enforcement agency to a central executive body with a special status, meaning it is now subordinate to the government, and not the president. Prior to that, the Constitutional Court twice declared certain provisions of the law on the NABU unconstitutional, in particular, regarding the appointment of its director by the President of Ukraine. The updated law on the NABU has settled the issue of the institution’s status and eliminated non-compliance with the Constitution.
The new law has also clarified how the selection process for the NABU head will be conducted; the introduced changes will ensure transparency of the procedure and help avoid delaying the competition.
The Bureau quickly and fully notifies of its work. Law enforcement agencies usually report news with delays and using complex language. Instead, the NABU decided to make its activity truly transparent, and together with the SAPO knight, it created a clear algorithm of actions for preparing and publishing news about pre-trial investigations. This is how we find out about the new high-profile cases from the primary source.
The knight actively interacts with the National Bank, the Anti-Monopoly Committee, the State Border Service, Tax and Customs Service.
However, other courts sometimes illegally interfere in NABU proceedings and try to change their jurisdiction, although detectives investigate cases that only HACC judges are to consider. For example, when the Pechersk District Court of Kyiv obliged the Prosecutor General to take the case from the NABU on suspicion of the head and judges of the KAC and the SJA head, and refer it to another law enforcement agency.
The knight has good material and technical support. Moreover, in 2020, the number of SAPO troops increased, which can strengthen the knight’s position on the battlefield.
It promptly and fully reports on the progress of the investigation of corruption crimes and reports news from the courtroom about the decision on those accused of corruption.
However, despite the specified problem, the institution shows good results of its work. This, in particular, is caused by the effective interaction of the SAPO with other bodies of the anti-corruption ecosystem.
The knight created an internal control unit for employees, which checks them for integrity. However, this NACP division checks the declarations of employees of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), NABU, and other intelligence officers through hidden procedures and contrary to the law. The problem is that in accordance with the law and prevention of conflicts of interest, this should be done by ordinary employees of the NACP according to the published procedures, and not by the internal control department, which is now headed by an ex-employee of the SBU.
The reboot of the body also triggered other changes: the NACP got access to all the necessary registers, launched the POLITDATA registry, which has simplified the reporting process for political parties, has developed an Anti-Corruption Strategy for 2021-2025.
During the year, the knight was able to overcome the consequences of the crisis of constitutional justice. On October 27, 2020, the Constitutional Court canceled criminal liability for lying in declarations, as well as the NACP’s powers to check declarations, along with open access to them. In two days, the Cabinet of Ministers made a decision, which obliged the NACP to restore access to declarations and unblocked the conduct of special verifications. In December 2020, all NACP’s powers were restored, and in March, the Agency began checking the declarations of judges and judges of the Constitutional Court, although the Constitutional Court and the High Council of Justice refused to coordinate the relevant procedures.
On November 10, 2021, the Cabinet of Ministers determined the NACP auditors, the assessment of the institution’s work should take place in 2022. An external audit of the Agency’s activity will be conducted for the first time, and this is the most important step because such an audit with the participation of international members of the commission is one of the safeguards for possible inefficiency and abuse in the work of the NACP.
The Register of Seized Assets has not been fully operational.
Still, the knight has developed a clear strategic development plan and supported himself with a good material and technical base. It has access to several hundred important registers and databases, including NACP registers, so it quickly finds the necessary information. However, its territorial divisions are understaffed.
In addition, the ARMA army does not have a code of conduct and ethics, so there is a risk of abuse. There are no internal and external mechanisms yet. Even though an independent external audit was conducted in the ARMA twice, there is no information for the last two years yet.
It is the court that will now have the right in its decision to transfer the ARMA assets for management to determine the method of management — sale or management. The threshold for the value of assets that are transferred to the Agency will be at the level of 200 subsistence minimums for able-bodied persons. The MPs also brought the ARMA law on this issue into accordance with the corresponding provision of the current Criminal Procedural Code.
The knight uses more than 300 information and reference systems, registers, and data banks to recover assets.
Asset owners have increased confidence in the work of ARMA. The knight can only manage property, money, or land plots if he receives permission from investigating judges, courts, and the owners themselves. In November 2021, the owners voluntarily transferred foreign currency to the knight for the first time, which in hryvnia equivalent is more than UAH 600,000.
Even despite the adopted changes in legislation, the potential of the ARMA is not fully reached. There is still a problem of blocking the ARMA’s work by administrative and economic courts, and the matter of planning before transferring assets for management.
Ideally, the ARMA should be a service body that systematically preserves the economic value of assets, and not a storage room for seized apartments, land plots, cars, and other things.
The HACC judges demonstrate high standards of professional behavior, they provide information about their income. The HACC as a court is quite active and constantly communicates about its activity. However, it doesn’t have a website on a separate platform that would contain all the information about the work. Moreover, judges do not have the right to fine for contempt of court those lawyers who disrupt hearings. However, the Parliament has already adopted a draft law that should address this problem in the first reading.
For more than 2 years of work, the HACC as a court of first instance delivered verdicts concerning 5 MPs (two were acquitted), 3 heads/MPs of local councils, 14 judges (two were acquitted), 1 prosecutor, 4 heads of enterprises, 6 lawyers, 30 representatives of other professions (six were acquitted), and the first sentence was passed against the ex-minister — he was acquitted.
The knight has a minimum percentage of violations in the work. For the past year and a half, TI Ukraine’s lawyers have been monitoring the activity of the HACC, and during the monitoring they recorded only minor problems in the procedural aspects of the work of the HACC.
n addition, the Anti-Corruption Court initiated the work of various practices, for example, the institution of agreements, civil forfeiture, and the bail mechanism. All of them have already proven themselves positively and are examples of bringing the institution closer to truly European standards.
For justice to be fair, all the national players must remember that the boundaries of the HACC knight’s lands are inviolable. Therefore, they are forbidden to interfere in the court’s affairs and try to influence judges. The Verkhovna Rada should also strengthen judicial guarantees in the law on the HACC so that the Anti-Corruption Court provides its army with security measures
To reduce pressure on judges, it is also necessary to change the mechanism for forming the High Council of Justice and turn it into an independent body. In addition, the knight should look for common ground with all participants in the trial for a constructive dialogue. However, this depends not only on his will — all parties should direct their efforts to build a qualitatively new justice system.
Thanks to the creation of the NABU, the SAPO, the NACP, the ARMA, and the HACC, tectonic shifts in the fight against corruption have taken place in Ukraine. The knights of the anti-corruption front have collected their own bundle of trophies and proved that the victory over corruption is, in fact, possible.
Anti-corruption knights have proved that MPs and high-ranking officials can be convicted, no one is untouchable, the seized property is adequately managed, integrity is not just a word and is thoroughly verified and highly valued. Whether it is enough — it is up to anyone to assess.
At the same time, the further we move, the more pressure is put on these knights. Their autonomy and independence are not ensured, systematic attempts are made to discredit the bodies and undermine public trust in them.
Overcoming corruption is a long way, and its results depend and will depend on all the players and the real intention to change the situation. Only the joint efforts of the 5 knights of the anti-corruption front can achieve effective results in their fight, and this is possible with the real independence of these institutions and the constant support of the government and all Ukrainians.
Materials from shutterstok.com have been used in the project