Ukraine’s budget conservatively misses out on at least Hr 3.5 billion ($155 million) of monthly customs duties due to corruption, Konstiantyn Likarchuk, who was in charge of customs at the State Fiscal Service before being fired earlier this month, told the Kyiv Post.
That means the state budget loses 20-30 percent in customs revenues, and Odesa Oblast Governor Mikheil Saakashvili wants to reverse this trend in the Black Sea
region.
To cut down on opportunities for graft in the region where last year
89.6 million tons of freight was handled through three ports, Saakashvili wants
to expedite customs clearance and make it transparent.
And the idea is to replicate the measures nationwide.
One bottleneck toward the changes is parliament, where much needed
changes in laws are required, as well as the appointment of the new regional
customs chief.
Giorgi Tskhakaya, who is currently an advisor to Saakashvili and was head of Georgia’s tax and customs agency in 2009-2010, is supervising the
overhaul of customs in Odesa Oblast. He took part in a similar reform in Georgia.
“We don’t want to just copy-paste the (Georgian reform) here, but would
like to improve it,” he told the Kyiv Post.
Part of the improvements is to open a new customs clearing zone in Odesa by January.
He said his task was not to reduce corruption “from 40-50 percent to 30
percent” but to “destroy it completely.”
An electronic system would be introduced at the customs office, greatly
reducing human contact and opportunities for bribe-giving.
“All rules will be set out in a very clear way,” he said. “We want to
close all of the black holes that currently exist… The system will not allow corruption.”
Tskhakaya also said the customs clearance period should be reduced to
between 15 minutes and an hour, from several weeks or even months now.
Moreover, all officials other than customs employees will be removed
from customs offices, he said. These include police, the Security Service of
Ukraine, prosecutors, health inspectors and the veterinary agency.
Tskhakaya wants this new customs system to go nationwide thanks to the
Odesa Reform Package, a legislative proposal presented by Saakashvili’s team
earlier this week. Otherwise corruption would just shift to other regions, he
said.
Another problem is that the leadership of the region’s customs office is
not committed to reform, Saakashvili’s team argues. Sasha Borovik, another
gubernatorial advisor, told the Kyiv Post that the authorities had been foot
dragging on selecting a new head of Odesa Oblast’s customs office.
In June Saakashvili called for the firing of Ihor Ustymenko, then acting
chief of Odesa Oblast’s customs, saying that he was a representative of one of
“Kyiv’s clans.” Last month he proposed appointing Yulia Marushevska, a deputy
governor of Odesa Oblast and a EuroMaidan activist, as head of the region’s
customs.
In August the State Fiscal Service announced a competitive hiring process
for the head of Odesa Oblast’s customs office.
The leading candidate for the job is
Larisa Arefyeva, a deputy head of Odesa Oblast’s customs office, Likarchuk
wrote on Facebook on Sept. 14. Her husband is a nephew of Ihor Alekseyev, a top
Communist Party official and a friend of Ihor Kaletnik, an ally of ex-President
Viktor Yanukovych, he said.
Vladyslav Raksha, who was appointed by State Fiscal Service head Roman
Nasirov as acting head of Odesa Oblast’s customs in July, is also linked to the
Communist Party and Kaletnik, Likarchuk wrote.
The State Fiscal Service did not reply to a request for comment.
Likarchuk was fired earlier this month after accusing Nasirov of
re-introducing Yanukovych-era schemes by appointing allies of the ex-president
and Kaletnik. He also published what appears to be a scanned copy of a property
title to an apartment owned by Nasirov in London.
One more stumbling block for customs reform is the recent row between
Saakashvili and the Cabinet.
The cabinet has
agreed to give part of the customs revenues in Odesa Oblast to the regional
government to finance the construction of a major highway if the revenues rise.
However,
subsequently the Сabinet foiled this plan, according to
Saakashvili, by increasing revenue targets for the region, depriving it of
customs revenues from the energy sector and by setting lower tariffs in other
regions.
Following
Saakashvili’s accusations, the Cabinet set equal customs tariffs in different
regions, reducing room for corruption.
Kyiv Post staff writer Oleg Sukhov can be
reached at [email protected].
