Anti-corruption as a Critical Condition for Sustainable Recovery

Many things have changed radically in Ukraine since February 24th, 2022. Corruption risks, unfortunately, have not. If corruption is allowed to go unchecked, Ukraine’s reconstruction would hand a massive victory for the subversive kleptocratic war that the Kremlin has been waging since Ukraine’s independence to undermine the country’s statehood. Therefore, effective anti-corruption systems are not “merely” important to fight corruption, but provide crucial defenses in the war against kleptocracy which is intimately linked to the military war.

This is not new to Ukraine, and the issue of corruption has always been prominent. The Corruption Perceptions Index shows that over the past ten years, Ukraine has been slowly, but steadily, improving. Ukraine is one of only 25 out of 180 countries that have improved in a statistically significant way in the past 10 years. The Association Agreement and the Visa Liberalization Action Plan with the EU, among other, and cooperation with other international partners has contributed significantly to this success. On the 23 of June this year all 27 member states of the European Union voted in favor of granting the candidate status to Ukraine which will also have a positive impact on the fight against corruption.

Yet, the existing anti-corruption defenses are not yet sufficiently robust to ensure reconstruction funds are spent with integrity, and this was also noted in the conditionality outlined by the European Commission. While it is unrealistic to expect that the country can progress all outstanding anti-corruption reforms while the war is still raging, some must be tackled right away. Together, these will enable anti-corruption fighters to unleash the fighting spirit that Ukrainians have become famous for.

Source: https://ti-ukraine.org/en/news/anti-corruption-as-a-critical-condition-for-sustainable-recovery/