The office of Dmytro Shymkiv, deputy head of the Presidential Administration, looks more like a working space for a corporate manager than for a government bureaucrat.
There is a big map of Ukraine on one
wall, a white board with markers on another one, a small laptop on
the desk and a Rubik’s cube next to it.
But a set of five old
Soviet telephones brings you back to the reality of just how difficult
it is to upgrade actual state governance, not just the office
accessories. And this is exactly what Shymkiv is tasked to do: his
job at the administration is to coordinate various reform
initiatives.
Shymkiv, who moved to this job after
heading Microsoft Ukraine, says he feels a lot of resistance to
change.
“In business, people are
result-oriented. But in public service, they are still process-oriented,” he told the Kyiv Post in a recent interview.
“The routine
starts to slowly swallow you here, you get used to all the papers. So
you always have to keep your mind set for change.”
One of the changes
Shymkiv brought with him was electronic correspondence at the
Presidential Administration, an office that employs more than 400
people. It was introduced on Aug. 19 – a month and 10 days into
Shymkiv’s appointment.
But the changes are yet to start
effecting all incoming papers. They will eventually all get
scanned and sent on by email to the various departments. The next
stage would be to switch to an encrypted email system with the
parliament and the Cabinet of Ministers.
“This is very
important because, if the process is facilitated, all the decisions
are taken much faster. It means that we, as the most important state
office, which is assisting the president, are working faster. So we
have to streamline the processes,” Shymkiv says.
This is relatively easy inside the
president’s office, but changes that would affect the whole country
are much trickier, though.
Take the president’s initiative to
advance the cell network to 3G format, the third generation of
mobile telecommunications technology, which he decreed on July 23. A
month on, the initiative has not moved an inch. Shymkiv said the
process is slow as the government is yet to issue a special decree
yet. Meanwhile, some countries in the world are starting to announce
the creation of 5G networks.
“I would like see
government taking the decisions faster,” Shymkiv says, adding that
in a democratic society all the branches of power have to consider
each other. “We (Ukrainians) have not a vertical, but rather a
horizontal of power, but this is what we were fighting for.”
To smooth out at least some of the kinks in the reform process, a special coordination body was
created, the National Council of Reforms. Its main function is
strategic planning, and it’s composed of the president, prime
minister, speaker of parliament, National Bank governor and
representatives of four non-government organizations which are
heavily involved in the creation of a reform plan for the nation.
The council can create working groups
of all shapes and is entitled to receiving all information from state
bodies and companies that it needs, by a presidential decree issued
last month.
But critics say that the National
Council of Reforms will be too bulky and too slow, partly because of
its three-tier structure.
“The launch of the
National Council of Reforms takes longer than actual reform,”
said Hanna Hopko, head of Reanimation Package of Reforms, a civic,
post-EuroMaidan initiative composed of many nongovernmental organizations with the aim to
drive the reform agenda in the nation.
Hopko added that she
was hugely disappointed to discover that some lawmakers of the former
ruling Party of Regions, including Serhiy Kivalov, who has been
implicated of rigging an election in 2004 which led to the Orange
Revolution, as well as Vitaly Khomutynnik and Yevhen Heller, will
take part in this new body.
Shymkiv explains that these officials
will be part of the council because heads of parliament committees.
“But the president takes a final decision about persons that will
join this body,” he said.
Shymkiv says that the most urgent
reforms that are needed is the judiciary reform, deregulation of
business environment, and a move to electronic state procurement –
a sector that has been notoriously wasteful and corrupt in Ukraine,
where many fortunes have been made.
Shymkiv says foreign countries and
agencies are queueing to help Ukraine reform. “I have papers on my
desk from the World Bank, which is proposing a project and a $400
million grant for medical reform. I’m taking to ambassadors, and
many countries are ready to help us,” Shymkiv said.
But half a year after the end of the
EuroMaidan, there is still little to show the society in terms of
actual achievements.
Moreover, two Cabinet officials who
were also tasked with reforming their sectors, special government
representative Tetiana Chornovol and Minister of Economy Pavlo
Sheremeta recently said they would resign over many frustrations they
have encountered in their jobs and their efforts.
Shymkiv said Sheremeta, his personal
friend, managed to crack the system but not break it. He added that
seeing the process from inside is at times very disappointing.
“We are fighting
not only against the system but also against a big corruption
structure,” he said.
Corruption which has been a problem for
decades, got to unprecedented levels during the tenure of former
President Viktor Yanukovych. But the system he built is yet to be
dismantled.
A special independent body, the
National Anti-Corruption Bureau that would be in charge of
investigation high-level corruption, is yet to be set up. There are
competing draft bills circulating, and they are yet to be sent to
parliament for approval.
Shymkiv says that petty corruption
inside the government agencies is also shocking.
“There are many
progressive NGOs (nongovernmental organizations) now, but nevertheless the representatives of some of
them may call me and start asking to take them into the National
Council of Reforms,” he said.
Sciety still
doesn’t know that an official is only allowed to accept presents
worth no more than about Hr 1,200, Shymkiv says. He plans to launch
an anti-corruption training program for state officials – just
like it happens in the corporate sector.
But he admits that it would be naïve
to expect changes soon.
“Recently it took
us four weeks at the Presidential Administration to rename a department. And
we are talking about systemic changes here,” he said.
Kyiv Post staff
writer Oksana Grytsenko can be reached at [email protected]
