Parliament's blocking of officials' declarations from opening for another year is eloquent evidence of how committed we really are to the EU.
But the report of an external independent assessment on the effectiveness of the National Agency for the Prevention of Corruption (NACP) is a precedent. 217 pages of detailed “debriefing” of the head and team of the key link of the entire anti-corruption unit. Under the lens of the international commission - 2020–2021. activities of NAPC. The main message of the new history of reforms for Ukraine: read, delve into it, draw conclusions! If, of course, you have brains, political will and civic competence. All cards are revealed.
NAPC fulfilled 72 percent of the criteria that the Cabinet of Ministers developed and approved for nine assessment objects. However, 28 percent of the “minuses” are harsh white threads with which the current head of NAPC threaded the entire activity of the agency, ultimately not allowing the international commission to recognize the institution as effective (read the Summary of the main conclusions of the report), and Alexander Novikov himself as an example for managers to follow government bodies.
We are talking about “the insufficient level of transparency of the agency’s work; serious errors in the approach to the development of regulations regulating the activities of NAPC employees in key areas; deficiencies in the organizational structure and personnel decisions, as well as in the implementation of the internal control function.”
At the same time, the commission did not dare to directly call the work of the NAPC headed by Novikov ineffective. However, the question is why? - can be used as an argument in favor of the current head only by those who have not read the report. Such a double assessment is rather a tribute to the stability of the institution, which, as we have already said, underlies the entire anti-corruption bloc, which is to be strengthened, and which by October will enter the competition to select a new leader.
Let’s try, based on the report, public facts that we recorded during Novikov’s tenure, as well as information from sources (including NAPC), to place the main emphasis on the state of the agency. The time for optimistic restraint in relation to the anti-corruption block is over. However, facing a sobering reality is always an opportunity to rise to the next stage of reform.
NAPC as an institution. Completed, but opaque with manual “manuals” instead of adjusted procedures
No one today questions the fact that the NAPC was established as an institution, and that it was Alexander Novikov in its new format (and the changes made to the law on the prevention of corruption in 2019 reformatted the NAPC management model from collegial to unity of command) at the first stage of leadership The agency managed to cope with the main task: to eliminate gross corruption in the body and assemble a professional team. Most of what NAPC brilliantly communicated during Novikov’s tenure on its website, in numerous interviews with the head, etc., up to a certain point, inspired exceptional respect and unconditional trust.
But as it turned out, several scandalous cases related to the position of the head of the NAPC, which came to light in the last year, confirmed the large-scale history of the transformation of the NAPC, hidden from prying eyes, from an anti-corruption body into an “autocratic” organization loyal to the authorities. At least, this is how Novikov saw and did NAPC. Unfortunately, the elimination of the “feudal fragmentation” of the once collegial NAPC (when members of the NAPC, led by Mrs. Korczak, vigilantly supervised department heads who were forbidden to communicate with each other) did not guarantee the protection of the institution from the “king”, deafened by the sound of copper pipes. Which is absolutely impartial and what the auditors recorded.
Manuscripts are burning
The first and key signal about the quality of the anti-corruption body - which, by definition, should be a model of transparency! - given at the very start of the report, where the commission, describing the sources of obtaining and collecting information for its research, indicated two packages of documents that it was never able to obtain from NAPC: “NAPC did not provide information regarding verification of the integrity of NAPC employees, because, according to According to NAPC, they were destroyed during the introduction of martial law in Ukraine by Decree of the President of Ukraine dated February 24, 2022 No. 64/2022.”
Seriously?! Do not doubt. Although we, of course, did not find any such instructions in the presidential decree. Yes, they couldn’t exist, because based on such logic, the NAPC would have to “throw away” its entire documentary base. But in the end, the manuscripts concerning the integrity of Novikov and his associates “burned out.”
And if dark thoughts immediately flashed through your head, just like in mine, then here you go: the ninth block of the report (criteria 9.30 - 9.32) describes in detail the simply outrageous facts regarding monitoring the lifestyle of NAPC workers, as well as a complete audit their declarations by the NACP Internal Control Department.
“The current procedures did not allow us to effectively check the declarations of NAPC employees and monitor their lifestyle,” the auditors conclude. — Many provisions of the Procedure for conducting a full verification of the declaration of a person authorized to perform the functions of the state or local government cannot be used to verify the declarations of NAPC employees. For example, to verify the declaration of the head of NAPC, additional precautions must be taken.” And not to use the general procedure according to the decision of the NAPC. However, a separate procedure has not been developed in the NAPC.
Question: what did they burn? Did you hide the results of inactivity?
Almighty internal control
While the agency's Internal Control Department clearly failed to cope with its main task, defined by law, the head of NAPC made an extraordinary (and, frankly, illegal) decision and assigned this department with additional responsible functions.
“The head of the NAPC assigned the function of checking the declarations of employees of intelligence agencies and persons holding positions classified as state secrets to the Internal Control Department of the NAPC, which does not correspond to the powers of this unit as defined by the Law on the Prevention of Corruption,” the auditors state (criterion 9.26). “Moreover, the head of the Internal Control Department was a former SBU official, which indicated a possible conflict of interest.”
Literally a couple of weeks after the publication of the auditors’ report, the head of NAPC Novikov fired the permanent head of the NAPC Internal Control Department, Roman Norts. But the dismissal did not occur as a result of Novikov’s attempt to resolve the conflict of interests of his childhood friend, but after a shocking incident that was made public on social networks by the daughter of the head of the Internal Control Department of the NAPC. Here it is hardly worth disclosing the details of domestic violence and the murder of Nortz, as the girl claims, of her pet. It is better, on the recommendation of the auditors, to focus on one more fact that is indicative of our analysis.
We are talking about the second package of documents - the procedures for implementing financial control measures in relation to secret service employees, which NAPC did not provide to the commission after several official requests. Claiming that “disclosure of such information would violate information security laws, interfere with the proper performance of official duties by NAPC employees, and pose a threat to national security.” No more, no less.
“Thus, the NAPC failed to introduce a transparent and accountable approach to verifying the property declarations of intelligence officers and persons holding positions classified as state secrets. The relevant regulations were not made public and did not undergo public discussion during development,” the auditors conclude.
Risks of opacity and, as a consequence, ineffectiveness of checks of declarations and lifestyle of secret service workers? There is a complete lack of state control over the quality of personnel appointed by the authorities to the special services, who en masse surrendered our territories to the enemy after February 24. Including simply selling.
And here we come up against yet another illegal scheme for the internal structure of the NAPC, “patented” by its current head.
Legally worthless manuals instead of statutory regulations registered with the Ministry of Justice
During his tenure, Novikov illegally transferred NAPC to manual control closed to himself. “One of the most problematic practices was the substitution of the head of the NAPC for the adoption of binding by-laws with so-called methodological recommendations or other non-binding documents,” the auditors state (criteria 9.8, 9.11).
Methodological recommendations, in contrast to the normative legal acts provided for by law, were not registered with the Ministry of Justice. “This practice violated the provisions of the law on the prevention of corruption, the principle of constitutional legality and other principles of the rule of law, in particular, legal certainty and predictability - do not forget that all these auditors are writing about the key institution of the anti-corruption bloc! “The use of such a procedure also allowed the NACP to avoid holding public consultations with the public on draft documents and not to publish the adopted acts.”
The commission was seriously concerned by the fact that this practice was systemic in nature and concerned various areas of activity, in particular such key areas as financial control of public servants and control over the prevention of conflicts of interest. At the same time, we remember that the methodological recommendations signed by Novikov are not a document at all, and they are not binding on anyone. In contrast to the Procedure prescribed by law, rechecked and registered by the Ministry of Justice, which can be an argument in court in the event of a dispute surrounding the actions or inaction of the same NAPC.
The audit commission clearly classifies all of the above-described actions of NAPC as illegal (criteria 4.9, 5.9 and 5.10) and urgently requires NAPC to change the system. In this series, there is another new case, which, due to the timing of its appearance, did not become the subject of the audit, but was also “methodically” created by Novikov outside the legal framework. We are talking about the so-called List of International Sponsors of War, which is compiled by the NAPC as part of its abstract project “War and Sanctions.” It requires separate consideration, of course. But now it is worth separating the public demand for justice during the war from the illegal activities of the head of a particular government agency.
If, regarding sanctions, Novikov was initially included in the interdepartmental group, therefore the active work of the NAPC in this non-core direction can be at least somehow justified. The list of international sponsors of the war is another “methodological” gobbledygook from the NAPC. Which nevertheless has become a powerful tool for influencing the international markets of individual countries. As a result of reputational losses caused by the actions of NAPC, the market value of certain companies falls, and accordingly, the competitors of these companies receive market advantages. At the same time, no one knows which of his manuals Alexander Novikov uses to add this or that company to the “black list”. Which in itself is a big corruption risk.
Plus, the list, as correctly stated on the website, is an important foreign policy tool. Only the agreed foreign policy of the warring state, and not the head of NAPC Novikov or any other head of a government agency. No matter who in the government or on Bankova stood behind him. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which is listed on the website as a partner of NAPC in the sanctions project, consistently writes official letters to the head of NAPC regarding the inadmissibility of Novikov’s abuse of power and the harm caused to the interests of Ukraine by such actions of NAPC.
According to our sources in the NAPC, this aspect of relations between Ukraine and the EU was touched upon by the head of EU diplomacy, Josep Borrell, in a working conversation with the Minister of Foreign Affairs. The EU Special Representative for Sanctions, David O'Sullivan, who came to Kyiv in mid-June specifically to meet with the leadership of NAPC, also strongly recommended stopping this practice.
This visit was caused by a real crisis, when, as a result of the actions of the NAPC, the 11th package of EU anti-Russian sanctions and the next tranche of military assistance worth half a billion euros were blocked. Greece was forced to organize a blockade in June 2023, after back in July 2022 (!) NAPC unreasonably added five Greek companies to the list of war sponsors, accusing them of violating the sanctions regime, which they actually did not violate. After this, for a year the NAPC simply ignored informal signals from the Greek government, transmitted through the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry.
As a result, under pressure from the European Commission, the NAPC temporarily suspended the status of “international war sponsors” for Greek companies, allegedly to conduct working consultations. This made it possible to unblock the 11th sanctions package and military assistance. But by an inexplicable coincidence, when in early August President Zelensky announced that Greece had become the 14th state to support security guarantees for Ukraine, NAPC returned all five Greek companies to the list of international war sponsors. A source in NAPC confirmed that decisions on inclusion in the list are made personally by Novikov. Motive?
Opaque competitions and “our” people
We remember very well how “Covid” became a convenient reason to castrate the civil service reform: competitions for civil servant positions were cancelled. The war only consolidated the gains of the authorities, who allowed themselves to manually compact ministries and departments with “their” people, with corruption and any other risks. The number of scandals that we are now seeing, including in the defense sector, is proof of this.
So, the NACP, which not only monitors the purity of declarations of government officials, but also patronizes units for the prevention of corruption in other government bodies, and which, by definition, should be a personnel example, to put it mildly, is not one (criteria 9.12. - 9.14 .).
The regulation on open competitive selection in the NAPC, which was adopted in March 2020, caused comments from auditors regarding “the procedure for holding special competitions, forming the composition of the commission, and passing an interview for integrity.”
Firstly, neither the test results nor the list of candidates admitted to the next stage of the competition were published on the NAPC website. Instead of the commission approving one winner of the competition, it offered the head of NAPC three candidates to choose from. At the same time, the number of members and composition of the competition commission remained unclear, which indicates excessive discretion.
“On the one hand, this created risks of changing the personnel or number of commissions for each specific competition, and thus the influence of representatives of the Public Council under the NAPC in the competition commission in some cases could be weakened,” the auditors note. “On the other hand, this practice potentially made it possible to create special competition commissions for specific competitions.”
Secondly, the Regulations provide that a meeting of the competition commission is valid if “more than half of the total composition of the commission” took part in it. And “the decision of the competition commission is considered adopted if the majority of those present at the meeting votes for it.” This means that less than half of the approved composition of the competition commission can potentially make a decision on any issue. What nonsense!
Thirdly, open competitions for the positions of heads of individual structural divisions of NAPC were mostly not held. NAPC abused transfer procedures instead of holding open competitions. Moreover, “the commission received confidential notification of examples indicating a lack of impartiality of members of the competition commission in the conduct of certain open competitions.”
At the same time, the head of NAPC, in a February interview with ZN.UA, said without a shadow of embarrassment that “the civil service reform is now practically not working. And the only institution in the state where competitions are still ongoing is NAPC.”
Novikov's entire control system is stitched with white thread. To summarize, we note that “Management and organizational capacity of the National Agency” is the only object of the auditors’ assessment, which scored only 48% of “pluses”, receiving, in fact, a “failure” rating (see the 9th object of the criteria).
NAPC as a function.
Assertive, but with an unresolved conflict of interests in relations with Bankova and the Cabinet of Ministers. Lined up according to Novikov’s patterns from the inside, NAPC performed its direct external functions. We are talking primarily about checking the declarations and lifestyle of officials at all levels, as well as the comprehensive organization of a system for preventing corruption in government bodies. It must be admitted that on the way NAPC encountered many giant boulders, which Novikov either valiantly moved - and this happened, or prudently avoided them.
“The most notable attempt to limit the powers of the NAPC was the decision of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine of October 2020 to abolish several important powers of the NAPC, in particular financial control over the assets and interests of civil servants,” the auditors quite expectedly recorded in the report. — The decision of the Constitutional Court seriously undermined the legal framework in the fight against corruption. This led to the closure of numerous criminal and administrative proceedings in relation to probable corruption or corruption-related offenses, including those in the area of responsibility of the NACP.”
Less than two months after the decision of the Constitutional Court, thanks to the tough position of the NACP and public pressure, parliament returned criminal liability for false declarations. But not in full: for illegal concealment of wealth, only a year of imprisonment is now provided. In this rather wild story for a civilized state, indeed, little depended on Novikov and the NAPC team.
As, indeed, in the chain of the following force majeure circumstances to which parliament specifically responded: first during the pandemic in 2020, putting the financial reporting of political parties on pause (was there a real need?), and then in 2022 — for the duration of martial law, canceling the declaration and verification of declarations. Including when entering the civil service. By the way, the deputies unexpectedly quickly unblocked the party case literally on August 23 (according to our sources in parliament, the adoption of bill 9419-1 was facilitated by one of the vice-speakers of parliament, one of the deputy prime ministers and one of the now former deputy heads of the NAPC). But bill No. 9534 (on a return to declarations and full checks) was first technologically inundated with amendment spam, and today it was voted on in the hall with a murderous edit: the register of declarations was left closed for another year with the opportunity for declarants to voluntarily submit to the NACP an application for the personal opening of a declaration during this year. This cynical slowness of the authorities speaks volumes about how we really aspire to the EU.
Anti-corruption strategy is both a merit and a problem of the NACP
The position and efforts of the NACP in the development and then adoption of the state anti-corruption strategy and government program are a European case. And it has every chance to lay the right foundation for preventing corruption in government bodies. The auditors agreed that the NAPC team developed a document (talking about strategy) of high quality.
“The ex-deputy head of NAPC Ivan Presnyakov and the head of the relevant department Dmitry Kalmykov worked on the anti-corruption strategy. In the work on the government program, Presnyakov was replaced by Andrei Vishnevsky. They did this in the most inclusive way possible,” says our source at NAPC. — International experts and public organizations were involved, it was a very long but important process. The only problem is that the strategy turned out to be not 100 percent relevant, since BP was not accepted for a long time. They tried to correct this in the program, on which 15 working groups worked together with NAPC, but its approval was also pointedly slowed down. Parliament was a year late, and then the Cabinet was another two months late.”
As a result, the program for the state strategy for 2021–2025. was adopted only in March 2023. Which is no longer surprising, right? Because the real attitude of any government to the fight against corruption should be sought not in high-profile projects based on PR and populism, such as, for example, the recent initiative of the president to equate corruption with treason (while simultaneously knocking out the systemic basis from NABU), but in specific routine actions of the government . Which, as usual, stretches out for years what should be accepted as quickly as possible. This is another expressive message from the NAZK auditors to Ukrainian society: look and search deeper. It is always easier to notice risks in time and prevent the emergence of corruption than to later prove a crime that has already been committed and punish for it.
“The point of the anti-corruption strategy is not to solve all problems and eliminate corruption within the period of its implementation,” the source continues. — The point is in the correct goal setting and technological decomposition of these goals into actions in the adopted government program - with the definition of deadlines, performers, budget, etc. Today the state has in its hands a technological map, where all those responsible for the details and the whole picture are visible. On August 18, the open part of the system for monitoring the implementation of the anti-corruption strategy was presented. You can go to the website and see the dynamics of fulfillment of assigned tasks for each ministry.”
So anti-corruption activists should start their mornings with this site to regularly ask the right questions to officials. At the same time, however, not forgetting about NAPC. Because the agency, being very carried away by the development of the state strategy, completely forgot about its own in 2020. Which, in the context of all of the above, is not very comme il faut.
Moreover, according to the auditors, “NACP should shift the emphasis from periodic planning of anti-corruption measures to the creation of an effective system of internal anti-corruption control in each government agency.” And with internal control, as we have already found out, there are big unresolved problems within the NAPC itself. This is precisely about the fact that, while demanding perfect cleanliness from others, wash the floor in your house.
Declaration, “quick” checks and single lifestyle monitoring
Here, caught in a loop, the auditors again pulled out a long management thread with methodological recommendations. “NACP introduced a new procedure for so-called “quick” checks of declarations instead of proper control over the correctness and completeness of their completion,” the commission states. “This went beyond his legal authority and caused duplication.” The NAPC classified several other internal acts as recommendations in an attempt to avoid public scrutiny and mandatory registration with the Ministry of Justice.”
The same thing happened in the case of the lifestyle monitoring provision, a procedure with a high level of interference with the privacy of the persons concerned. “Instead of adopting the regulation, as it should have done, NAPC issued recommendations to its staff,” the auditors note. “This practice has created legal risks for the exercise of NACP’s financial control powers, which undermines confidence in the National Agency.” This is the key function of the agency!
The NACP must carefully consider the concerns of stakeholders and inclusively define and apply a procedure for selecting declarations for mandatory full verification (criterion 5.6.). “The sequence of such testing should be determined based on a risk assessment rather than vague recommendations.”
In the minefield of conflict of interest: Ermak, Tatarov and Co.
“The commission recorded a dubious management decision by the head of the NACP: not to use random automated distribution of cases to verify cases of conflict of interest and other related violations.” (By the way, the automatic distribution of declaration verification is also a problem; the commission pointed out that the procedure was written in such a way that manual intervention is possible). That is, to put it simply, Novikov, through another manual, gave himself the sole right to decide which of the NAPC employees will consider cases related to conflicts of interest. Moreover, our entire system of power is built on a conflict of interests, and preventing corruption means correctly and in a timely manner indicating where such a risk exists. Boldly.
And what is already painfully familiar to us: “During the assessment period, the NACP abolished the procedure for drawing up administrative protocols for offenses related to conflicts of interest and other anti-corruption restrictions (for example, gifts and incompatibility). But the NAPC issued three separate “methodological recommendations”, which define how authorized NAPC employees should identify relevant offenses, collect evidence and prepare administrative protocols on violations. Regulating this procedure through “recommendations” deprives the relevant officials of legal certainty and may lead to abuse of power by the NACP.”
An explanation for Novikov's management strategy, which is even more troubling for auditors, may be that "this approach is used to avoid potential liability for NAPC's failure to properly perform its functions." “The Commission cannot agree with this practice, since it limits the accountability of the NACP and undermines the basic principles of the activities of public authorities,” the audit puts an end to the “diagnosis.”
The Commission identified numerous cases where the NACP failed to fulfill its responsibilities in terms of monitoring and preventing conflicts of interest. This list includes the cases of Tatarov, Ivanisov, Vitrenko, Leros, Ermak and others (criterion 4.15.). Here are two of the most discussed examples in society and analyzed by auditors.
Tatarov's case. “In March 2021, the CPC contacted the deputy head of the OPU, Oleg Tatarov, regarding a possible violation of requirements related to a conflict of interest. In 2020–2021, he was involved in criminal proceedings as a suspect. At the same time, attempts began to interfere in the implementation of criminal proceedings against Tatarov, as NABU has repeatedly reported. The State Bureau of Investigation also played a role in this obstruction: it conducted a pre-trial investigation in criminal proceedings, within the framework of which the materials of the court case were seized, which was crucial for the transfer of criminal proceedings against O. Tatarov from NABU to the SBU,” the auditors describe the situation .
At the same time, the commission clarifies that Tatarov continued to coordinate the activities of law enforcement agencies, and his conflict of interests was resolved only in relation to NABU, the Prosecutor General’s Office and the SBU. As for other bodies, in particular the State Bureau of Investigation, such decisions were not made. “The CPC sent an appeal regarding these circumstances in March 2021,” the audit clarifies. — In response to this, on March 17, 2021, the NAPC announced (letter 33-02/14969/21) that it would monitor and control compliance with relevant legal requirements. Subsequently, the NAPC did not inform about the decisions made or measures taken. Only in response to an additional request, the NAPC reported (letter 92-02/69888-21 dated September 17, 2021) that it submitted requests to the OPU and OGPU and received from them the necessary information and copies of documents.
The NAPC letter also states that the OPU “has taken measures to eliminate any possibility of interaction with the Prosecutor General’s Office, NABU and SBU,” and the corresponding powers were assigned to the deputy head of the office of the President of Ukraine Smirnov in December 2021. “However, it follows from the response that the lack of review of Tatarov’s powers in relation to other investigative bodies, including the State Bureau of Investigation, was not investigated at all,” the report says. “In addition, the NAPC did not provide any assessment of the key allegations set out in the appeal. In addition, the Law of Ukraine “On the Prevention of Corruption” does not provide for such a measure for resolving conflicts of interest as “eliminating any possibility of interaction” with someone. Therefore, the question arises about the legality and validity of the decisions of the NACP during the inspection in principle.”
In this regard, the auditors drew attention to Novikov’s revealing answer to a question in an interview with a journalist from the Slovo i Delo publication regarding the general monitoring of the NACP conflict of interest in the case of Tatarov:
“Word and Deed”: “Mikhail Tkach’s investigation into the celebration of Oleg Tatarov’s birthday was recently published. Deputy Prosecutor General Alexei Simonenko came to him, who, in fact, took Tatarov’s case from NABU and SAP and transferred it to the Security Service of Ukraine in December 2020. Are you checking these facts?
Alexander Novikov: “We have not received any requests regarding this. I want to emphasize that a conflict of interest will exist if friendly or any other relationships arose before the decision was made to transfer Tatarov’s case to the SBU. You yourself said that Simonenko made a decision almost a year ago. That is, the fact that he attended Tatarov’s birthday a year later cannot in itself indicate a conflict of interest, even for chronological reasons. We cannot start monitoring on our own because there is no reason.”
Ermak's case. “The CPC notes that at the beginning of 2020, a journalistic investigation of the Schemes program (Radio Liberty) reported a possible violation of restrictions on receiving gifts by the head of the OPU, Andrei Ermak, who used a private plane for free for a flight from Minsk to Kyiv,” the commission describes the situation. — The CPC contacted the NAPC regarding a possible violation of the requirements of the Law of Ukraine “On the Prevention of Corruption.” In response to this appeal, the NAPC reported (letter 31-02/13555/20 dated April 14, 2020) that “actual data is being collected on the basis of which the presence or absence of an administrative offense related to corruption will be established.”
However, according to the auditors, NAPC did not send further information about the results of such an audit. Meanwhile, the deadline for imposing an administrative penalty has expired. According to the commission, the NACP took an unreasonably long time to check these circumstances. The Anti-Corruption Center was not informed what specific actions were taken as part of the inspection. “Accordingly, the commission cannot assess whether the authorized persons of the NAPC took appropriate actions to establish all the circumstances necessary to make a decision.”
Of course, the answers to all these questions can be given by Alexander Novikov himself, who manually appointed NAPC employees who spent “an unreasonably long time” checking Ermak’s case, turned a blind eye to Tatarov’s actions... and to anyone who represents the government today. And to whom does the head of the key anti-corruption body, Alexander Novikov, demonstrate obvious loyalty? Which, in fact, was recorded by the external audit. This is why we can always have suspicions.
And not only here. No matter how much today Novikov shakes hands with mayors on camera, signing memorandums of cooperation, they clearly know that the NAZK protocol on the mayors of Chernigov and Rivne is Novikov’s submission to the interested Bankova. Yes, the NAPC drew up the correct protocol, and the court, working out the scheme, applying an unreasonably strict decision, removed the mayors from their posts. But, as they say, the nuances are now clear.
NAPC as a guarantee. Designed to maintain the legislative framework, but holding a pause under pressure from interested parties
All activities of the NAPC are primarily aimed at changing the behavior of officials. Competitions for civil service, declaration of assets, monitoring of conflicts of interest, as well as the inclusion of functions to prevent corruption within ministries, agencies and other institutions should systematically limit the appetites of those who decided to improve their financial situation through bribes and kickbacks. The extent to which the institution under the leadership of Novikov succeeded was determined by the audit, and we tried to outline all the connections in our narrative.
However, there is another level of authority of the NACP, which was not fully studied by the auditors (the audit methodology was drawn up and approved by the Cabinet of Ministers), and which turned out to be scattered across all nine objects of their assessment. We are talking about anti-corruption examination of draft legislative acts adopted by parliament. After all, you can check declarations as much as you like, write strategies and programs, but if people’s deputies adopted a low-quality legislative act, then all officials who regularly declare will comply with the rules of a obviously corrupt law. And this is, perhaps, the most important lever of the NACP, with the help of which the anti-corruption institution can influence the behavior of the state system as a whole, and put entire industries within a healthy framework.
The algorithm of actions of the NACP is standardized by Article 55 of the relevant law, the internal Regulations of the NACP, as well as its own methodology. For this purpose, a special department was created in the agency, and relations with the government were established. “NAPC managed to achieve amendments to the Regulations of the Cabinet of Ministers and forced the Cabinet of Ministers to send draft regulations to NAPC for anti-corruption examination,” the auditors specify.
However, something else is important: the lack of a clear mechanism for action after receiving the conclusions of the anti-corruption examination of draft laws from the NACP. That is, the NAPC cannot force ministers and deputies to write laws without corruption loopholes built into them, and parliament cannot force them not to adopt them. The authorities may or may not pay attention to the NAPC's comments. However, the NAPC has a powerful tool in its hands - publicity. Why, in fact, does the agency have its own media platform and Public Council (and, by the way, where is it?). But here, too, things didn’t work out for Alexander Novikov.
Scandalous bill 5655 as a marker for Novikov
The bill on urban planning reform is, in fact, the first signal that allowed the public and the media to doubt the correctness of what is happening inside the NAPC. We have written enough about this history of lobbying without rules on the part of the authorities, but we will literally outline with a dotted line the chronology of the role of the NAPC in it. This is an extremely important case, since the basis for corruption is being laid for an entire industry that will play a key role in post-war reconstruction.
NACP published its conclusions on the subject of corruption mines 5655 back in October 2021, literally three months after the registration of the bill. “Overcoming corruption in this area requires the development and adoption of a comprehensive legal framework for the development of urban planning, as well as the introduction of an effective system of state control and supervision. Taking into account the above, a necessary step to minimize corruption risks in the field of urban planning is the adoption of the Urban Planning Code. The draft Law contains corruption-prone factors and requires revision taking into account the specified recommendations,” summarized the NAPC experts. And they gave their recommendations on how to fix everything.
For more than a year, the construction lobby, led by the key author of 5655, head of the Servant of the People party, Elena Shulyak, “followed the recommendations of the NAPC”, spammed the bill with amendments, actively pushing it into the hall. All this against the background of the obvious lack of acceptance of the bill by the main stakeholders - local governments, the architectural community and experts. In conditions of complete opacity, government lobbyists changed the bill by 90 percent, and the relevant committee, which was headed by Shulyak on the eve of the vote, approved the second reading and set a date for voting in the parliament hall. All this was actively covered in the media, and the process was closely monitored by the head of NAPC Novikov.
Which, by the way, has in hand the results of a recent NACP study on priority sectors for strategic analysis of corruption risks. Where, based on the results of an analysis of areas/industries based on the criterion of the likelihood of corruption risks, three areas of public administration and economics were identified, corruption offenses in which are most often encountered as the subject of prosecution or investigative journalism. In the top three, in addition to energy and energy saving, those involved in Law 5655 are government regulation of business and land relations.
Next up is a detective.
Alexander Novikov, according to the NACP Procedure, who is personally responsible for anti-correct expertise, prudently transfers all the official part of communication on 5655 to his recently appointed new (unsuspecting?) Deputy Andrey Vishnevsky.
November 30, 2022 - NAPC, signed by Vishnevsky, sends a letter to the committee with a laconic conclusion that the new version of Project 5655 does not comply with the anti-corruption strategy. Improve it! And eight pages of recommendations.
“Zerkalo Nedeli” previously wrote that, according to Art. 55 of the Law of Ukraine “On the Prevention of Corruption”, the NAPC may, on its own initiative, take the rewritten bill for anti-corruption examination, which is the basis for stopping the procedure for its consideration or adoption for up to ten days. It is important to note: experts argue that, according to paragraph 5 of the above-mentioned Procedure, these ten days may only be sufficient to monitor a legislative act, especially if it has been rewritten by 90 percent. And if corruption norms are identified, then the NACP is obliged to take the bill for anti-corruption examination. And it doesn’t matter whether it’s repeated or not, what’s important is that corruption has been identified. However, the lack of clear wording on re-examination in the law (and we remember that the anti-correct examination of the first reading of 5655 was carried out), if the head of the agency has some other goals other than the systemic elimination of corruption risks, then the NACP, of course, may not conduct a re-examination examination. One way or another, this will definitely need to be clarified by the legislator, but the relevant committee headed by Shulyak, even based on the results of the NAZK monitoring, received 10 points of comments and recommendations.
At the same time, the NAPC does not conduct any public communication regarding its official position. But since the parliamentary process remains completely closed, and deputies are already talking about the scheduled voting date in the hall, the National Union of Architects of Ukraine appeals to the NAZK with a request to clarify its position.
December 8, 2022 - NAPC, signed by Vishnevsky, gives a response to the Union of Architects, where it clarifies that, according to information from the relevant committee, whose meeting was held on the same day, NAPC’s comments were taken into account, but NAPC has not yet received the final version of the document.
December 9, 2022 (four days before the vote) - “Vice Prime Minister for the Reconstruction of Ukraine Alexander Kubrakov, holding a working meeting with representatives of the embassies of the G7 countries and the Eurodelegation, focused specifically on taking into account all the comments of the NACP and emphasized the importance of the fact that “ The key anti-corruption body supports this reform.”
December 13, 2022 - Parliament, with the support of the OPZH votes, votes 5655. On the same day, a petition to the president demanding to veto the law received 25 thousand votes.
December 14, 2022 - Alexander Novikov in an interview with NV directly stated the following: all the conclusions of the anti-corruption examination and recommendations of the NACP were fully taken into account. From the point of view of anti-corruption mechanisms, the NAPC does not see articles that would create corruption risks. The NAPC does not have any questions about the law to the extent that was analyzed by the Anti-Correxpertiza.
And then - the denouement.
December 26, 2022 - NAPC, signed by Andrei Vishnevsky, responds to a repeated request from the NSAU, clarifying that NAPC received the final version of the bill only on December 9, that is, four days before the vote. Vishnevsky, pointing to the neutrality of the position of the NAPC (which is normal for an anti-corruption body), clarifies that representatives of the NAPC did not take part in the committee meeting on December 8, and were not present on voting day, and the final text submitted for signature to the president has not yet been published.
“Therefore, despite the widespread information about taking into account the comments and recommendations of the NAPC (with references to preliminary information from committee members), writes Vishnevsky, “the NAPC is now unable to draw final conclusions about the extent to which its comments and recommendations were taken into account.”
That is, Novikov had such an opportunity on December 14, but his deputy did not on December 26.
At the same time, Vishnevsky, focusing on the unfulfilled fifth paragraph of comments and recommendations, confirmed that in the latest version of the bill, which was transferred to the NAPC, most of the comments were nevertheless taken into account. What a majority is is not specified in the letter, but we can clarify. At that time, “the analysis of the final version, which had already become public, indicated that “only two comments of the NAZK can be considered fully taken into account (4 and 6), five comments were partially taken into account (2, 3, 7, 8 and 9), the rest three are not taken into account at all.” We are talking about comments 1,5,10.
And now another official quote from Novikov’s deputy Andrei Vishnevsky, who a few months later was fired on another case, where he also dared to voice a position different from the head of NAPC: “The National Agency has always emphasized - and in its public position at the committee meeting on November 28, 2022 , and in informal communication with diplomats of the G7 countries (Alexander Kubrakov, read carefully! - Author), that the main corruption risk of this law is considered to be its development in an insufficiently open and inclusive way, in violation of the principle of transparency and taking into account public opinion established by the Law Ukraine “On the fundamentals of state regulatory policy in the field of economic activity.” A curtain!
However, the NAPC, of course, did not make any public statements on this matter. Although Novikov, if he wished, could not only take the law for re-examination, but even turn to the president with a request to veto the law, the mechanisms of which regulate one of the three most corrupt areas in the country. Moreover, in the history of NAPC there have been such daring cases, which, by the way, were recorded by auditors (evaluation criterion 8.2). Why didn't this happen? Perhaps, for the sake of strengthening the foundations of the key institution for the anti-corruption bloc, Andrei Vishnevsky will want to talk about this? As well as what to do within the framework of the unity of command of such a specific institution, when only the leader knows “how to correctly” prevent corruption. Otherwise, get out! Because deputies are at the discretion of the head of NAPC. Simply put, its continuation.
While Alexander Novikov actively attends the events of the Ministry of Infrastructure, where the author of 5655 Elena Shulyak talks with a blue eye “about the transparent foundations on which the future restoration of Ukraine will be built.” Including “the philosophy of the law, which is literally stitched with harsh compulsion of corrupt local authorities to restore order in urban planning documentation.” Mrs. Elena, read the recommendations of the NAPC: “The wording of the draft Law strengthens the role of urban planning conditions and restrictions and neutralizes urban planning documentation at the local level.” However, the recommendations of the NASC, including in this part, were not implemented. No matter how skillfully you sew with your white threads.
How should anti-correct examination work? “The institutional capacity of the NAPC in this direction is very weak,” our source in the NAPC clarifies. “The presence of just one small department in such a vast and complex area does not solve the problem, although it allows us to successfully help ministers and deputies who turn to the NAPC in the process of preparing bills. The national agency must have a sufficient number of deep experts in all key sectors. And the procedure needs to be improved - to eliminate legal uncertainty and the possibility of double interpretation of the rules, so that similar situations do not arise, as with 5655. Only a transparent, inclusive approach that should help the purpose of this instrument. Anti-correct expertise management resources should be many times greater. Then the NAPC will become one of the leading parts of the corruption prevention system with its checks and balances, including the Ministry of Justice, the Anti-Corruption Committee of the Verkhovna Rada and the expert department of the parliamentary apparatus.”
conclusions
Firstly, the benefits of the NACP audit conducted by the international commission cannot be overestimated. The shocking information, in fact, put the current head of NAPC Novikov on the shoulder, and, as many people think, “could undermine the foundations of the institution.” At first sight. And on the second, more attentive and deep, this is our real bridge to the European Union. When we can read the truth, speak the truth and build a state of truth.
Secondly, it is quite obvious that autocratic unity of command in such structures has its own great risks. So does collegiality. And this is a topic for the global work of legislators and analysts - whether to appoint a deputy head of the NAPC through the hands of the Cabinet of Ministers, whether to change the methodology for the competitive selection of the head himself, to give an additional channel to employees within the NAPC to inform (the question of whom?) about violations of the head (by the way, the audit noted that such a channel of internal communication of the agency is completely blocked by Novikov).
Third, the philosophy and mission of the NACP must change from a priority of punishment to a priority of effective prevention of corruption. NAPC is not about a cudgel that needs to be waved demonstratively, it is a system of complex instruments that should change the behavior of officials and set a healthy framework for all systems of public administration.
