The National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine plans to purchase laptops for its employees for almost UAH 7.5 million. The order was divided into two lots: the first for 102 computers, and the second for 85. This is evidenced by the data on the Prozorro website.
The expected value of the tender was over UAH 10 million, but Portal Arena LLC offered to supply laptops to the NABU for almost UAH 7.5 million.
As you know, the NABU plans to hire about 300 employees over the next three years, most of them detectives and analysts. In 2024, only the first stage of this selection is underway.
Even if in 2024 the NABU recruited a third of the announced vacancies, i.e. 100 new employees, they still do not need two laptops per person. Therefore, there are doubts about the feasibility of so much new equipment.
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The NABU also wants to buy almost 1.3 million hryvnias worth of air conditioners, while the government and international organizations warn about the extremely difficult energy situation this winter. In addition, the bureau will spend more than 50 thousand hryvnias to purchase three portable weather stations.
The budget spent on the maintenance of anti-corruption bodies is also impressive. The costs of NABU, SAPO, and HACC over the entire period of their existence amount to approximately UAH 12-13 billion. At the same time, the budgetary appetite of the anti-corruption agencies is growing every year. This is all paid for by taxpayers, for whom the next fee increases have already been prepared.
At the same time, there are still big questions about the effectiveness of the anti-corruption agencies. Foreign experts have identified a number of problems in their report on the NABU's performance. In particular, the auditors concluded that detectives need to communicate with psychologists and the ombudsman to report problems in the workplace.
In addition, international auditors have statedthat the HACC reviews cases for years, while NABU detectives can investigate them for decades. However, as practice shows, the duration of an anti-corruption investigation does not affect its quality, as “high-profile” NABU cases against high-ranking officials have repeatedly fallen apart in courts.