The first chief of Ukraine's new Anti-Corruption Bureau might be appointed within days. Or the lengthy selection process for the country's top corruption fighter might start all over again. The outcome hinges on the fate of a bill filed to parliament by three deputies from the ruling coalition on March 5.
The
bill was filed just as the vetting commission, which had itself been
appointed through a complex democratic procedure, was lining up a
short list of four candidates for a security checkup. After that, the
final two or three candidates will be offered to the president, who
will have 10 days to take his pick.
The
whole appointment process has already stretched for months, and now
the new bill aims to change the criteria for selecting head of the
Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU), which means that new candidates will
be able to apply, and the whole process of examination of resumes and
interviewing will have to start all over again. In particular,
authors of the bill want to lift the age limit on candidates, which
currently stands at 65.
The
authors, who represent President Petro Poroshenko’s and Prime
Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk’s factions in parliament, explain that “
the limitation is not sufficiently justified, because the person’s
stay in office should not depend on their age,” but personal
integrity and “ability to perform the duties.”
But
Giovanni Kessler, one of nine members of the vetting commission who
was appointed within Verkhovna Rada’s quota of three, says the new
law amounts to “political interference” in the appointment
process.
He
said the parliament is effectively trying to hijack the powers of the
vetting commission by tweaking the administrative procedure.
“If
they create a rule for a specific situation, specific procedure,
they’re dealing with the administrative procedure, which is the
selection of the head of NABU, by themselves. So, what’s our role?
They’re doing our job, they are selecting a candidate,” Kessler
said.
Vitaliy
Shabunin, head of the Anti-Corruption Action Center, a non-government
organization that has been driving the process of creation of the
NABU, which has already been dubbed “Ukraine’s FBI,” said that he
thinks the attempt to change the playing field is a result of the
president’s and the prime minister’s unhappiness with the short list
of candidates.
The
list includes Viktor Chumak, a vocal corruption fighter in parliament
from Poroshenko’s own faction; Artem Sytnik and Yakiv Varichev,
former investigators in prosecution offices; and Mykola Siry, a
lawyer for former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko.
The
candidates were selected out of 176 contenders, including foreigners,
most notably former Tbilisi prosecutor David Sakvarelidze. A smaller
pool of 21 candidates was interviewed by the vetting commission, and
recordings of these interviews are available online.
Kessler,
who heads the European Anti-Fraud Office in Brussels, says that the
selection process was professional and transparent, and resulted in
selection of four strong candidates with complimentary skills that
would make a good team.
Chumak,
who received the biggest number of votes, hinted on his Facebook page
that he would offer job to the rest of the short list if he is
picked. “This would make a good team. There would be enough work
for everyone,” he wrote.
Kessler
says that during the selection process he found that most of the
candidates lacked skills to investigate transnational financial
crimes, essential to tackling modern-day corruption.
“They
don’t bring you the money, the bribes, in a shoe box anymore,” he
says. “Even purely domestic investigations have transnational
aspects.”
The
typical case of modern bribery takes place offshore, as a financial
translation between companies that belong to the giver and the
receiver, based on what looks like a legitimate invoice for some
services. The contenders had trouble demonstrating the skills
required to track those operations.
“This
is not surprising. Ukraine (and other countries in Eastern Europe)
have been cut off from international cooperation, especially in law
enforcement fields, so they lack this knowledge, which is of utmost
importance in these investigations,” Kessler says, adding that the
European Union would be able to train investigators to track such
operations.
The
Anti-Corruption Bureau can have up to 700 staff members to
investigate, hiring that will also take time. But even once they’re
in place, they cannot be expected to investigate many cases in the
first year.
“Six
would be a success,” says Kessler.
But
it’s not the number that’s important, he adds. The first cases have
to deliver two important points: that no crime will remain
undetected, and no senior official is immune from investigation, even
if they’re friends with the president or the prime minister.
“You
need three investigations in the first year to deliver these two
points,” Kessler says.
