In a bout of extraordinary transparency, 50,000 Ukrainian officials have declared their assets and incomes and it is easily accessible to the interested public. A staggering amount of wealth has been revealed and this very act is likely to have changed Ukraine for good. As declarations arrived on the publicly accessible register, it recorded the most notable assets, cash, bank accounts, cars, watches, real estate, and companies.
October 30 was the deadline for Ukrainian officials to declare their wealth. I happened to be in Kyiv that day and the next and people talked about little else. The comments varied greatly. Some were happy over the openness, while others were shocked by what they learned.
