External Influence, Manipulation of Expert Evaluations, and More: NABU Auditors Want to Hear from the Public about the Problems of Anti-Corruption Activists

On October 8, international auditors of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine will hold a meeting in Kyiv with representatives of NGOs and other civil society representatives working in the field of preventing and combating corruption. This is reported on the website of the Cabinet of Ministers .

The members of the commission for external independent evaluation of NABU activities want to hear the public's opinion on the work of anti-corruption officers. The meeting will be closed and registration is required. Participants will be able to share their vision of the issues and draw the attention of the commission members to the issues they consider important. However, everyone who is registered for the meeting is asked to adhere to the principle of off the record for the sake of an allegedly "open and unbiased conversation.

It is worth noting that the public has recently raised a lot of questions about the work of detectives of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine.

In particular, there have been frequent statements lately about the loss of independence of anti-corruption bodies in Ukraine. In particular, this was stated by the recently dismissed First Deputy Director of the Bureau, Gizo Uglava. He has repeatedly hinted that decisions at the NABU are made under the influence of external factors rather than on the basis of the law. Among the individuals and institutions that, in his opinion, exerted this pressure were activists of the Anti-Corruption Action Center (AntAC) and the head of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Anti-Corruption Policy, who, as Uglava noted, used to work at the AntAC.

Uglava has repeatedly emphasized that the actions against him indicate serious problems in the NABU investigation process, which is focused on achieving external goals rather than establishing the truth.

The same opinion is supported by lawyers, who have also repeatedly stated that the real goal of anti-corruption activists has turned from fighting corruption to putting pressure on certain public officials to achieve "external" goals.

In addition, the lawyers' community is sounding the alarm over NABU Director Semen Kryvonos' idea to create his own forensic expertise at the bureau, because "their" experts in the investigation have nothing to do with an independent investigation.

In addition, the Public Control Council (PCC) of the NABU recently stated that detectives are not effective in investigating corruption in the defense sector. According to Kateryna Datsenko, a military wife and representative of the PIC in the personnel commission, a significant increase in the number of corruption cases in the defense sector was expected with the outbreak of a full-scale war. However, as of today, only 48 criminal proceedings are underway, and only 7 people have been notified of suspicion.

The public has repeatedly drawn attention to the fact that the NABU wastes public resources and time on cases that are not critical and have questionable judicial prospects. A good example is the case against the former Minister of Infrastructure Volodymyr Omelyan. Almost three years were spent investigating this case, in which the HACC eventually delivered an acquittal. By the way, neither the NABU detectives nor the SAPO prosecutors have ever publicly apologized to Omelian or been punished for illegally bringing him to criminal responsibility.

A similar story may now repeat itself with former Minister Mykola Solsky, who was publicly accused by NABU and SAPO in May of misappropriating land . The point is not that Solsky himself took possession of the land, but that he helped ATO soldiers to register land plots that, according to detectives, should have gone to other people, in particular, to be put up for auction by the State Property Fund for the sale of land. This story is already eight years old, and the reasonable investigation timeframe has long since expired, but detectives decided to announce suspicions this year. In the near future, they plan to interrogate almost 1,500 ATO soldiers. In addition, the NABU tried to leak the expertise in the case against Solsky, which they themselves ordered and which, obviously, was supposed to testify to his innocence.

As practice shows, anti-corruption agencies created by "one idea" turn a blind eye to each other's violations. For example, recently, the former Deputy Head of the Presidential Office Andriy Smirnov statedthat some NABU detectives and SAPO prosecutors acquired elite assets that were registered in their mothers' names. At the same time, the NACP did not check either NABU detectives or SAPO prosecutors  - arguing that the information provided by Smirnov "does not contain factual data that could be verified within the rights and powers" of the agency.