Without it, it is impossible to have civil peace in the country, where a rebellion joined by millions of people started after excessive use of force against peaceful protesters on Maidan on Nov. 30, 2013.
Rebellion against police brutality was the essence of EuroMaidan Revolution events.
Soon after new parliament was elected in 2014, a draft law on police reform was submitted. It was a product of long-lasting work of local experts, signed by representatives of several pro-Maidan factions in the new parliament (I was one of them).
The law was far from being perfect, as well as far from being a radical police reform – rather, that was a compromise between requirements of the society and the real capabilities of reformers.
Unfortunately, the government voluntarily rejected that draft law. Instead of that, they pushed their own version of the law on police. Their law is much “softer” in terms of innovations.
At first, the changes in police looked fantastic. The new patrol police force was created in Kyiv and several other cities. Re-attestation started. Old bribe-loving DAI (road police) disappeared.
However, the experience of nine recent months leaves us only to hope for better.
Last August, Bogdan Tytsky, an activist of Maidan and veteran of Russia’s war in the east, got his arm broken in three places in a squad car after police captured him on the street. Still, he has not received any accusation against him from police nor explanation why he was treated in such a brutal manner.
Serhiy Oliynyk, a member of the new police force who shot the passenger of a car that was breaking the speed limit, appeared to be an “old policeman” involved in illegal prosecution of Maidan activists.
Anton Shevtsov, recently nominated as a chief of police in Vinnytsia Oblast, appeared to be involved in Kremlin-backed separatists’ activity in Crimea.
After he was exposed, he tried to run to Russia.
Corruption scandals still are the issue. There are videos of a person who looks like Vadym Troyan, present deputy of chief of National Police, arranging corruption deals.
Police also are blamed for its passivity while there is massive violations of election law in Kryvyy Rih, where former members of Yanukovych’s clan have a significant influence.
However, an ordinary citizen is rather concerned about the rapid growth of crime rate since November, when the main novels of law on police started to work. A 55 percent rise in burglaries and 76 percent in robbery took place within two months.
Now, the question is – what is wrong?
Either the people who conduct the reform? Or the concept of reform itself? The answer probably is – there is room for improvement in both.
The peculiarity of Ukraine is that foreign experts work on the positions that require tons of experience in police activity as well as deep knowledge of Ukrainian conditions.
For example, Khatia Dekanoidze, the chief of the national police force, didn’t have any experience in police at all and had not worked in the country previously. Thus, she faced a great challenge, being responsible for all actions of 250,000 police officers.
The similar situation is Eka Zguladze, deputy interior minister, chief coordinator of police reform.
It is difficult to imagine how it is possible to effectively manage police, for instance, in the United States or Moldova or Georgia without knowledge of local language and local legislation, and having zero experience in police activity.
Of course, there is some success.
Attestation as a procedure is a great chance for local civil society to clean the police system from criminals and corruption.
This task is for prosecutor’s office, however, prosecutors are too weak and judges are too “loyal” to top police officers, therefore the only legal way to reduce the influence of former Yanukovych’s people is to remove them through attestation.
Nevertheless, this chance also is at risk.
Unfortunately, present Interior Ministry chiefs do not provide a unified approach to all police officers who are tested. Special concern involves those police officers who are suspected in involvement in crimes against Maidan activists.
One of the examples is attestation of Ihor Kupranets, former GUBOZ official (GUBOZ was a police department against organized crime, used by ex-President Viktor Yanukovych to organize terror against Maidan activists).
Kupranets passed the tests successfully even before the actual testing started, e.g. before the corresponding instruction regarding attestation was issued.
It was also surprising to see that this “attestation before attestation” was supported by votes of such a respected members of attestation commission as Robert Peacock, the chief of local ICTAP program, Tamara Slipets, the ICTAP advisor and Nataliya Shuster, European Union consultative mission advisor.
Another part of the problem is that there are some cases whey former GUBOZ top officials are appointed to the positions in new police without any attestation!
An example is Vitaliy Stryzhak, ex-deputy chief of GUBOZ during Yanukovych’s times, who was appointed as the head of criminal police in Kyiv now.
The reasons of all these illnesses remain the same.
Lack of civil control over reform, insufficient quality of police reform legislation, unwillingness to conduct an open discussion with local experts and no communications with the parliament.
Ukrainian member of parliament Igor Lutsenko is on the committee for preventing corruption in the Verkhovna Rada.
