The Accounting Chamber asked ARMA to establish cooperation with law enforcement officers: Duma went to give lectures to cadets

The head of the Asset Recovery and Management Agency, Olena Duma, seems to have taken the recommendations of the Accounting Chamber on the need to establish cooperation with law enforcement officers too literally. Instead of systematic work with prosecutors and pre-trial investigation bodies, the head of ARMA decided to hold lectures for cadets, writes UNN.

Details

In recent days, ARMA reported on two meetings of Olena Duma with cadets - at the National Academy of Internal Affairs in Kyiv and at the Lviv State University of Internal Affairs. 

Both meetings were presented as a "strategic dialogue with law enforcement officers and future security sector specialists for results and professional cooperation." Perhaps in the long term, such meetings will help ARMA establish relationships with law enforcement officers, but so far it looks more like another PR campaign by Duma and does not solve structural problems in the agency.

Each arrested asset is not just a management object. It is an instrument of justice. We are turning a shadow resource into a resource of the state. And it is thanks to the principled position of professionals who stand guard over the rule of law - from investigators to analysts, from patrol officers to teachers - that the system works and has a future. Your generation has a chance to make it even stronger

It is worth noting that earlier the Accounting Chamber conducted an audit of ARMA for 2022-2023 and the first half of 2024, which showed significant problems in the management of seized assets. Among other things, the auditors focused on the unregulated relationship between ARMA and the prosecutor's office and the low level of asset transfer to management.

So, while dozens of arrested assets do not bring income to the state, the head of the agency continues to demonstrate "activity" in the form of lectures and public statements.

Reminder

Earlier, the head of the Verkhovna Rada's Anti-Corruption Committee, Anastasia Radina, noted that maintaining a constructive dialogue with ARMA is constantly complicated by manipulations. She cited three examples that demonstrate how the agency distorts data about its activities. One of them, Radina called the case when the Anti-Corruption Committee asked ARMA how many assets they have and how many of them have been transferred to management? The agency reported that there are 69,000 assets in the register, and 36,000 have been transferred to management, or about 47%. However, a detailed analysis revealed that 20,000 of these 36,000 assets are movable property of Mezhyhiria, including bottles of wine, furniture and documents, which have no independent economic value.

In response, the head of ARMA, Olena Duma, called on the MP to "analyze the information".

Later, Anastasia Radina published an analysis of ARMA's work under Duma's leadership and noted that in a year and a half in office, she concluded only seven contracts that brought income as of the end of 2024. 

In addition, according to the head of the Anti-Corruption Committee, despite the existence of dozens of seized commercial facilities in the portfolio of the Asset Recovery and Management Agency, most of the income to the state in 2024 was provided by two state-owned enterprises, and not by tenders held by ARMA.