Rada puts off bill easing NABU head dismissal

Ukraine’s parliament voted on July 14 to return bill #3133
to the parliamentary human rights committee for review, the nv.ua news site
reported the same day. Recall, the bill expands the list of criteria to dismiss the head of the
National Anticorruption Bureau (NABU), aimed at
enabling the soon dismissal of Artem Sytnyk, a figure widely supported by
Ukraine’s Western financial partners. In April, the IMF warned Ukraine’s top
officials that approval of this bill would threaten its cooperation with
Ukraine.

The Rada decided to put off the bill’s approval at the
initiative of David Arakhamia, the head of the People’s Servant parliamentary
faction, who placed a call to one of the deputy heads of the president’s
office, according to the nv.ua report.  

Alexander Paraschiy: The
postponement of this bill, whose approval would have definitely upset the IMF
and other Western partners (including the U.S.), is the latest in a series of
events in which Ukraine narrowly avoided spoiling its relationship with the
West. This event, as well as President Zelensky’s assurance the same day to the IMF head that
Ukraine’s national bank (NBU) will get an independent governor,
adds to the likelihood that Ukraine will not undermine the key reform
achievements of recent years, despite an apparent desire of the president to
take control of both the NBU and NABU.

However, this event does not guarantee that pressure
on these two bodies will not intensify in the future, particularly in the event
that Ukraine’s public finances become less dependent on official multilateral
support. That said, Ukraine’s mid-term risk of a reforms rollback remains
solid, unfortunately.