Tomorrow, the Competition Commission for the selection for the post of head of the National Agency for the Prevention of Corruption plans to announce the winner.
This person will become the head of the agency during the war and will lead it for the next four years. But the competition itself and the determination of its winner raise big questions.
Information has already appeared in the media that the competition for the head of NAPC was held in a non-transparent manner, and the name of the new leader was determined behind the scenes even before the official completion of the selection. They say that Andrei Vishnevsky will become the new head of NAPC - Artem Sytnik is allegedly lobbying him for the position.
The topic is quite interesting and my sources confirm the veracity of the insights.
So, although the selection of candidates has been going on since December last year, media attention to it has been minimal. With the exception of a few publications from public organizations brought in by the commission itself to help run the competition, and a few legal publications, there was no other analysis.
64 people submitted documents for the competition. 51 were admitted to the selection, then 24 who scored the most points entered the second stage of the competition. And it was at this moment that the competition commission (three representatives of Ukraine and three from international organizations) entered the subjective evaluation mode.
Only 10 chosen ones were left, although it is unknown by what criteria they were lucky. Because among them there are people who can confidently be called dishonest, not all have experience in leadership positions, and some barely scored the minimum points during the transparent assessment stage.
At a closed meeting with members of the Commission, representatives of public organizations directly spoke about the lack of transparency of the selection. But this did not influence the decision. Why some were disqualified and others accepted remained a mystery.
And here the role of Artem Sytnik, the ex-head of NABU, who was previously brought to justice for corruption violations, becomes interesting. Now he is the first deputy chairman of NAPC.
As the media note, on February 22, a closed meeting for a “narrow circle” was held in Sytnik’s office. Two of its participants immediately spoke on condition of anonymity - Sytnik directly stated that the winner of the competition would be Andrei Vishnevsky, and the backup option, in case of force majeure, would be Dmitry Kalmykov.
Like, everything will happen with lightning speed - on February 25, the commission will announce the winner, who will be appointed as quickly as possible. The next step is replacing the substituents. Sytnik himself, by agreement with Vishnevsky and Kalmykov, will allegedly remain first deputy and will be responsible for financial control. Kalmykov will also receive the position of deputy.
If some kind of force majeure happens, then the scheme will be different - Kalmykov is the chairman, and Vishnevsky is the deputy.
More interesting things from sources:
- completely liquidate the unit that dealt with issues related to bringing Russia and its accomplices to justice (this is the “right” decision in war conditions)
- in general, about 50% of the agency’s staff will be fired and, separately, the internal control and HR team that conducted internal audits of Vishnevsky.
“The NAPC must fight nepotism and promote transparent competitions for appointments to government positions. The imitation of the competition, which Sytnik boasts to the team, puts an end to the future four years of NAPC work,” said a NAPC employee who was present at the meeting.
“Rumors about a deal between Kalmykov and Vishnevsky with Sytnik, who, through the Anti-Corruption Center, will provide one with a victory and the other with a deputy, have been around for a long time. We thought it was standard noise. When Sytnik confirmed this, they realized that what would happen next was “everything for friends, law for enemies,” explained the second media source.
Several other sources in the government, NAPC and among the public sector named one of the two names as the likely winner. They explain this as the main reason - support from Sytnik, including allegedly thanks to his close contacts with Irina Shiba, who heads the secretariat of the commission.
We will see on February 25 how exactly the scheme will be implemented. But it is already obvious that in fact it puts a big end to the very idea of NAPC as an independent anti-corruption structure.
A dubiously legitimate and behind-the-scenes leader... Seizure of power in the NAPC by a narrow group of people... Discrediting the entire system of competitions... This is too high a price that a warring country will pay for the wounded ambitions of one person. Because with such approaches you can say goodbye to the agency as an independent and effective structure.
PS
By the way, interesting information is circulating about the two favorites on the Internet. I quote what I found:
Dmitry Kalmykov:
Dmitry's brother was convicted in 2017 of financing terrorism.
Kalmykov himself had connections with the so-called. “LPR”, which they used to preserve their property in the occupied territory and transfer resources from the territory controlled by Ukraine.
Andrey Vishnevsky:
He left all his previous jobs with scandals; at the Ministry of Justice he even sat at a table that was taken out into the corridor to convince him to leave the office.
In 2011 he was involved in a criminal case for hooliganism, and in 2013 for drugs.
He was caught falsifying a document stating that he was unfit for military service. He submitted this document to the NAPC.
Vishnevsky was previously dismissed from NAPC under article - for improper performance of duties, after an internal investigation.
The competition commission was aware of all this, but it decided simply “not to ask unnecessary questions.”
