People’s deputies of Ukraine
President of Ukraine
Dear People’s Deputies!
The President of Ukraine promised a law on electronic declarations (No. 9534), which provided for a closed register of declarations of persons authorized to perform the functions of the state or local self-government under martial law.
The Ukrainian Business Council, as the largest association of business associations in Ukraine, which includes 110 leading associations of various sectors of the economy, welcomes this decision of the President and calls on the parliament to take into account the position of the head of state during the re-examination of the draft law.
Earlier, on September 4, 2023, the VRU Committee on Law Enforcement took a step back in the anti-corruption reform, supporting a number of controversial norms in the draft Law on Amendments to the Code of Ukraine on Administrative Offenses and other laws of Ukraine on improving the procedure for bringing to justice persons authorized to execute of functions of the state or local self-government No. 9587-d.
The amendments to Article 59 of the Law of Ukraine “On Prevention of Corruption” provided by this project actually destroy most of the Unified State Register of persons who have committed corruption or corruption-related offenses. Since it is planned not to enter in the register information about persons who have been brought to disciplinary responsibility for committing corruption or (failure to submit declarations, concealment of wealth), as well as to remove most of the already available information about corrupt persons. Despite the fact that most of the laws contain restrictions – at least three years for the acceptance of persons to public positions after being prosecuted for corruption – the project provides for only one year of information storage in the register. After that, they are deleted, and no person can verify the integrity of the official.
Also, on September 5, 2023, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine failed to vote on an amendment to the draft Law on Amendments to Certain Laws of Ukraine on Determining the Procedure for Submitting Declarations of Persons Authorized to Perform the Functions of the State or Local Self-Government in Martial Law No. 9534, which provided for the immediate opening declarations of public persons. Despite all the appeals of the public, legislators lacked 27 votes to open the Register of Declarations now, and not in a year. The necessary amendment on the opening of declarations to the main bill No. 9534, initiated by the Head of the Committee on Anti-corruption Policy Anastasia Radina, received only 199 votes.
The Ukrainian Parliament has retreated from the path of democratic development, once again compromising the principles of accountability and transparency of the government to the Ukrainian people and international partners. This, in turn, increases political instability during the war, undermines the confidence of Ukrainian society in the reconstruction process and affects the reduction of international aid.
As a coalition that joins efforts with the aim of ensuring sustainable economic development of the country, building an “open access” society and building a modern, sustainable, open and competitive economy on a global scale, the Ukrainian Business Council calls on people’s deputies to restore democratic processes in Ukraine, re review and amend the draft law No. 9534 and return to the state when information about the government was transparent, as it was before the war.
We also call on the President of Ukraine to return draft No. 9587-d to the Parliament with amendments, to ensure an open register of declarations and storage of information in the register for at least 5 years.