Can Ukraine win it’s War on Corruption?

 

European SME Business Club in cooperation with the SME Europe of the EPP and the Ukrainian European Perspective  we delighted to welcome the governmental delegation of Ukraine headed by Yuriy Lutsenko, Prosecutor General of Ukraine. The two-day visit was joined by Lukas Mandl MEP, Arne Gericke MEP, Boguslaw Gertruda (EEAS), Tomas Zdechovsky MEP, Petras Austrevicus MEP, Tobias Gotthardt (Chair of the WG Start-Up and Entrepreneurship of SME Connect), Michal Boni MEP, Ivan Stefanec MEP.

Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko has spoken for the adoption of a particular law on the confiscation of real estate and funds in bank accounts that have no official explanation and believes that the need for such a law may be used in an electoral campaign to the Verkhovna Rada.

The most urgent issue is an introduction of a law similar to the recent British one – a special law that allows the confiscation of real estate or accounts that have no official explanation. This is the law that Ukraine has needed for a long time,” the prosecutor general said on air of the 112.ua TV channel on Tuesday after the debate in the European Parliament on corruption in Ukraine.

He recalled that the Verkhovna Rada had several times considered the bill on the so-called particular confiscation, but failed to pass it. Therefore, at the moment, the law-enforcement agencies confiscate property obtained through criminal means based on the provisions of the old law, and the confiscation procedures are very complicated and “often subject to attacks by interested persons, both publicly and legally.”

Therefore, we need a law on special confiscation, and it is very important to take into account the British experience, which is very simple and clear: if a law enforcement system asks a question of any citizen or guest of the UK: ‘Please show the sources of, for example, a five-story house in central London’ and if these sources do not exist, this property passes into the state ownership and later is sold at an auction. The same goes for the funds that are frozen in the accounts. From my point of view, such procedure would speed up cleansing Ukraine of corruption and criminality,” Lutsenko said.

At the same time, the prosecutor general said he doubted that such a law could be adopted by the Verkhovna Rada of the current convocation. “I think that this parliament will not pass this law, but it can become one of the key concepts around which it is possible to build the next election campaign to the next parliament,” he said.

more from this event here and here