Ihor Hryniv, head of President Petro Poroshenko’s faction in parliament, first submitted a bill to effectively kill the system of electronic property and income declarations for officials, and then had to withdraw it under public pressure.
The Supreme Court asked judges of the Constitutional Court, who are being investigated on suspicion of being bribed by ex-President Viktor Yanukovych and helping him usurp power, to cancel judicial reform. Both courts are reportedly influenced by Poroshenko.
Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko, a Poroshenko loyalist, has been fighting for the right to determine which cases can be investigated by the National Anti-Corruption Bureau in an attempt to emasculate the only law enforcement agency independent of the president, while a Poroshenko Bloc lawmaker has submitted legislation to implement the idea.
Poroshenko is also seeking to obtain the right to unilaterally appoint governors and district administration heads, which critics say would let him usurp and monopolize power.
Interior Minister Arsen Avakov is pushing to endow the police with powers to ban citizens from disobeying even illegal orders of the police.
And little-known non-governmental groups are seeking to liquidate the ProZorro electronic public procurement system, while the government’s open corporate register is experiencing DDoS attacks.
All of these efforts look to be part of a plan by the authorities to destroy the few checks on their pervasive corruption.
Ukrainian leaders are trying to fool the West into thinking that they are carrying out reforms, so as to get financial aid and the cancelation of visas with the European Union.
In fact, they are doing the opposite.
Ukraine’s civil society and its Western friends will face an uphill battle with those in power this fall. The battle’s outcome will determine whether Ukraine finally moves towards the rule of law or reverts to a Yanukovych-style gangster state.
