Ballast and balance

Much has been said and written about the administrative reform of the current president and his administration. This reform appears to be underway, much to the public’s surprise. Will they actually cut down on the number of bureaucrats, on various levels? The quick launch of this reform seems to have taken everyone completely unawares, yet the reason behind it is simple enough: the need to replenish the central budget, which is being drawn up and closely followed by the IMF. After the bungled offensive against small businesses, they had to find other ways to replenish their budget, so bureaucratic staff reductions came in handy, looking quite popular and correct in the public eye. This campaign was launched to improve the president’s image, which has suffered some damage of late. More often than not, however, this boils down to cadre reshuffling, so as to proceed to make the less popular reforms. This was also a decisive PR move, to portray the current head of state as a real threat to the existing bureaucracy, although there remain the usual open questions of theoretical and practical aspects of this reform. Statistics read that there were 637,000 bureaucrats holding posts in Ukraine, as of January 1, 2010. Naturally, most of them are rank and file. Should they fear losing their posts? Yes and no. On the one hand, staff reductions should affect them in the first place. On the other hand, the principle of delegating powers to, and shifting them from one bureaucratic institution to the next, makes them irreplaceable in the chain of bureaucratic command.

In other words, there will be staff reductions on this level, but not on a large scale, the more so that in the regions the situation is principally different, considering that not all of the local bureaucratic institutions have this lowest category of clerks; they have their own district [raion], city, and oblast structures — precisely where the Ukrainian in the street is confronted by their red tape. There every bureaucrat is an embodiment of the whole governmental machine, and every local bureaucrat, appointed after the last presidential election, is eager to feather his nest. Hence the general public’s attitude to practically every public servant. In other words, bureaucratic staff reductions in Kyiv will bear no good tidings for the Ukrainian in the street, least of all for those in the provinces, for whom the main thing is to see the red tape cut — for social protection, passport issuance or adoption procedures. Unless this man in the street sees such staff reductions, the whole reform will be worth nothing. Add here Ukraine’s militia and tax authorities, all of which leave this man in the street furious, considering that the president’s initiatives have obviously failed to find their way to them. A closer look at President Yanukovych’s administrative reform shows that the current head of state has mainly struck at the middle-level bureaucracy, involving various government services, departments, inspectorates — a dozen at every ministry. From now on, all such state committees and other semi- and pseudo-autonomous structures are part of the ministries. Staff reductions have also affected the latter. Ex-Minister Anatolii Tolstoukhov says these bureaucratic staff reductions will save 120 million hryvnias from the budget.

Apparently, there were Soviet atavistic trends in the Ukrainian ministries, as in the case of the Ministry of Industrial Policy, which actually had no administrative functions, as well as the Ministry of Economy (now a superstructure of the Tenders Chamber).

The Ministry of Coal Industry (Minvuhleprom) was formed in 2005. Its formation was warranted by the importance of the coal industry, but now it is part of the Ministry of Fuel and Energy (Minpalyvenerho). The Ministry of Public Utilities, a brainchild of the Party of Regions, has been logically made part of the Ministry of Regional Construction (Minrehionbud). The Ministry of Agrarian Policy (Minahropolityky) has shared some of its services and committees with the Ministry of Ecology (Minekolohii). For example, the State Committee on Land Resources of Ukraine (Derzhkomzem) may well become one of the Minahropolityky’s organizational divisions, whereas the Minekolohii may receive jurisdiction over the forestry, fishery, water management, and veterinary services departments.

The Ministry of Family, Youth and Sports has been abolished. The man who headed it, Ravil Safiullin, was regarded in the government circles as a close associate of Rinat Akhmetov and Borys Kolesnikov. Now the former ministry’s functions will be discharged by none other than Dmytro Tabachnyk.

The Ministry of Coal Industry has been made part of the Ministry of Fuel and Energy. The man who headed the former, who had displeased President Yanukovych in the spring of 2010, has been retired. The jurisdiction of the Ministry of Industrial Policy, headed by Dmytro Kolesnikov, another member of Rinat Akhmetov’s group, has been transferred to the State Agency for Management of State Property and Corporate Rights. Judging by this reform’s results, the State Registration Service will assume more responsibilities, registering everything from real estate to political parties.

The Hydrometeocenter of Ukraine is being liquidated, with some of its functions to be transferred to the State Service of Meteorology, Geodesy and Cartography, along with several duties previously assigned to the Minpryrody, MNS (Emergency Management Ministry), and the State Geodesy, Cartography and Cadastre Service. Under this reform, the State Passport and Migration Service will be entitled to provide, supervise, and monitor all such Interior Ministry’s services, in lieu of the liquidated State Migration Service.

Characteristically, under this reform, ministers affiliated with Volodymyr Lytvyn’s bloc have received the pink slips, particularly Kostiantyn Yefimenko, the minister of transport and communications of Ukraine. His ministry has been reorganized into the Ministry of Infrastructure, including the State Road Transport Service, State Aviation Service, State Communications Service, and State Sea and River Transport Service. This whole project is being supervised by Deputy Prime Minister Kolesnikov, the Ukrainian Cabinet’s number three after the Prime Minister and First Deputy Prime Minister Andrii Kliuiev in charge of economic development and trade.

Vasyl Nadraha is no longer Minister of Labor and Social Policy. Today all social matters are supervised by Serhii Tihipko. In other words, all coalition members have been relieved of their ministerial posts (especially in the case of Vasyl Tsushko, former Minister of Economy, given the post by the Communist Party’s roster). Among other cadre replacements, Mykhailo Brodsky, one of the most hated leaders of Maidan-2, has been retired as chairman of the State Committee on Entrepreneurship. After removing Brodsky, President Yanukovych received an ovation from all those who had been expecting harsh cadre decisions in the aftermath of rallies protesting the Tax Code bill.

In fact, Serhii Tihipko has been denied supervision over the economic sphere. He is no longer a reform-minded deputy prime minister, just a cabinet member tasked with social protection, placed in charge of the bureaucratic structures that are hated and considered to be inherently ineffective by the general public.

As a result of this administrative reform, the number of ministers has been reduced a little, yet unconvincingly so, considering that this reform was originally meant to cut down on the ineffective bureaucratic structures. And so there are 10 instead of 14 ministries, along with 15 agencies.

Anyone believing that there will be jobless bureaucrats on the Ukrainian job market should think twice because this reform is mainly not about liquidating bureaucratic structures but replacing them. Take a closer look at the president’s edict and you will realize that these bureaucratic structures merge and transfer their functions. True, this reform put things in order, but it doesn’t change the process. As stated by Mykola Azarov, the retired bureaucrats shouldn’t mourn their lost posts; all will eventually find jobs.

Special emphasis should be placed on the social sphere, something that has never been a priority with the Party of Regions. Sad but true: Dmytro Tabachnyk will retain his post. Worse so, his powers have reached those of a de facto deputy prime minister. He is now in charge of education, science, youth, and sports. He will further supervise matters relating to intellectual property and what used to be the Higher Attestation Commission (VAK). Also, considering that the Institute of National Memory is being placed under the Cabinet’s jurisdiction, Tabachnyk will have a lot to do with it — which means the Institute’s slow and painful death.

Placing VAK and youth matters under the ministry’s jurisdiction was a logical move, of course. Formally, everything is OK in the context of the administrative reform. However, considering Tabachnyk’s ideological mission as a member of the current Ukrainian government, his career may have two outcomes: (a) absolute fiasco, being actually boycotted, even sabotaged by the intelligentsia and university students, and (b) breaking the worldviews of these two problematic social groups.

Minister of Culture (Minkultury) Mykola Kulyniak has retained his post while losing some of his powers, unlike Tabachnyk, including tourism, now under Kolesnikov’s jurisdiction, although the Minkultury now supervises interethnic relationships, ethnic minorities, and religions, after the liquidation the State Committee on Religions, a Soviet legacy. Apparently, the administrative reform — rather an optimization project — is most likely to produce a less than important effect. The president has discharged the ballast by eliminating some minor ministers, mainly for political and personal reasons. Outwardly, there is a fine balance between the main groups of influence within the cabinet and the head of state has every reason to feel proud. However, the new reform is actually another distribution of the spheres of influence between those who embody this balance. These people keep their posts as deputy prime ministers, while all the other cabinet members are assigned the minor role of carrying out their orders. Yanukovych can no longer rely on the old cabinet machine; he has to prove that his is a professional team — although his personal view on who is a pro and can actually serve the good of Ukraine may not always be correct. Anyway, the current head of state has every right to assume responsibility for the existing cabinet membership. Given the reinstated powers under the 1996 Constitution, he is Ukraine’s sole decision-maker.

Iryna Akimova, deputy head of the Presidential Administration, has admitted that Ukraine probably ranks first in the world by the number of bureaucrats. Ukraine’s central budget annually spends 60 billion hryvnias on the bureaucratic machine, a hair-raising figure. It stands to reason to wonder about the current president’s reform, about all those millions of hryvnias “saved,” about the whole affair being another PR campaign. Until this reform is implemented on the local/provincial level, until the Ukrainian in the street can reduce his contacts with any bureaucrat to a minimum (preferably to e-mail), he isn’t likely to thank the head of state for his dedicated effort.