' “The creation of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau, the National Agency for Anti-Corruption and a number of legal amendments, for instance increasing jail time for corruption offences, are all milestones, meaning that the tools to fight corruption will soon be available,” says Marusov.'<blockquote>'Nashi Groshi has been on the front line of the fight against corruption in Ukraine since 2011, monitoring public procurement by comparing prices paid by state organisations and companies with market prices, and establishing links between the winners of rigged tenders and state officials.
“We see clearly in public tenders – the size of kickbacks has fallen from around 50% under Yanukukovych to 35%-40% in 2014, and is currently at around 15% in 2015,” Shalayskiy tells
bne IntelliNews.
“In 2014 two islands of corruption in state procurement remained – that was [state-owned gas producer] Ukrgazvidobuvanie and Ukrainian Railways, despite having new CEO's appointed after Maidan,” says Shalayskiy. “But in both cases the new CEOs have been fired and in the first case arrested. Now there is a chance that in both companies corruption can be stamped out.”
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Shalayskiy acknowledges that corruption remains strong in the hidden sectors, where NGOs such as Nashi Groshi have no access to data. This include the tax and customs services and the state treasury. Black market schemes for tax evasion continue to operate with the suspected collusion of tax officials. “Every businessman knows the names of the platforms providing such services,” says Shalayskiy. Kickbacks are also still required for exporters to have VAT returned, as well as for suppliers to the state to receive payment from the treasury.
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Transparency International's Andrei Marusov likewise believes that while corruption remains immense in Ukraine, there has been progress since Maidan in creating institutions to combat it:
“The creation of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau, the National Agency for Anti-Corruption and a number of legal amendments, for instance increasing jail time for corruption offences, are all milestones, meaning that the tools to fight corruption will soon be available,” says Marusov.
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Leschenko acknowledges that corruption remains endemic in Ukraine one year after the ousting of Yanukovych. “But at least we have not seen any gigantic corruption over the past year comparable to that under Yanukovych,” he says.
Leschenko believes that one new appointment should now make an enormous difference in the anti-corruption fight. In an historic first for Ukraine, prosecutor general Vitaly Yarema resigned on February 9, after Leschenko gave voice to mounting public dissatisfaction at Yarema's inactivity. The new prosecutor general, Viktor Schokin, has already made two arrests of leading former Yanukovych officials in one week, the first such arrests since the ousting of Yanukovych one year ago.
Leschenko argues that going forward it will be crucial to prosecute current officials, rather than rounding up Yanukovych's gang. “Nothing sends a more powerful signal to the elite that the rules of the game have changed than the sight of one of their own going to jail,” he said.'
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Tide turns against corruption in Ukraine one year after Maidan, February 24, 2015</blockquote>
Context Ukraine - '..it is corruption, above all, that Mr Poroshenko and (after the parliamentary election) a new government must tackle..'<blockquote>
'..the consequences of not assisting Ukraine will be far worse than any of those from doing so.''Ukraine is the West-Germany of our time.''There is no more tolerance for corruption in Ukrainian society, if it is not dealt with very soon, there will be another revolution.'</blockquote>