Denmark, consistently ranked among the world’s least corrupt nations, will give aid to fight graft to one of the most corrupt ones, Ukraine.
Copenhagen is set to lead the implementation of a 16 million euro European Union anti-corruption project. Due to begin early next year, it comes on the watch of Danish Ambassador to Ukraine Christian Dons Christensen. A veteran of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, Christensen began his diplomatic career in Moscow in 1999. He told the Kyiv Post that even though Ukraine’s war with Kremlin-backed armed groups in the east continues to demand time and energy, the country must not allow this to stop the drive for reform.
“Mustering this counter-pressure against an aggressive neighbor to the east takes a lot of resources,” Christensen said in an interview with the Kyiv Post. “Not only human and economic resources, but actually also mental resources,” he said.
“But to be successful in countering that aggression and in building a successful, independent, sovereign state, Ukraine really needs to put full throttle on the reform process. Strategically, that is the way to succeed in the – let’s not call it a war – but in the overall competition of societal models with the neighbor to the east.”
Christensen is no stranger to the fight against corruption. His country provided a grant that went toward developing the IT system behind Ukraine’s new online database of public officials’ assets. This act of generosity, however, was not welcomed by all Ukrainian officials.
“We saw centrally placed actors speaking of a waste of Danish taxpayers’ money,” said the ambassador.
In fact, Christensen has come face-to-face with lawmakers who make little effort to hide their hostility to the push for transparency. But when it comes to pointing the finger he is, at least publicly, maintaining a diplomatic silence.
“I’m not going to mention names,” he told the Kyiv Post. “Those people know who I’m talking about, and Copenhagen knows who those people are, but I wonder if the Ukrainian people actually know.”
‘One-stop shop’
According to documents provided by the Danish government, one of the main aims of its upcoming program is to establish “a visible one-stop shop” to which those involved in fighting corruption in Ukraine can turn to get “expertise, training and IT supplies.” Support will be targeted especially at those of Ukraine’s new institutions whose sole purpose is to push back against graft. These include the National Anti-Corruption Bureau, the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecution Office, and the National Agency for Corruption Prevention.
In addition to working with such major institutions, however, the Danish also envision a series of smaller projects at the local level that would “implement a broad range of anti-corruption tools and measures in a concentrated fashion, and in a limited geographical area.” Copenhagen is hoping that such an approach will yield results that can then be replicated across Ukraine, and which will demonstrate that “change is possible if conditions are right.”
Above all, says Christensen, the aim is to lay the groundwork in preparing for Ukrainians themselves to assume control of the process.
“The whole reform effort is built on ownership,” said the ambassador. “It’s built on the need to build the capacity of Ukraine herself to fight corruption. We’re not taking on responsibility to fight corruption. What we are trying to do here over the next three years is to make sure that a lack of expertise or a lack of resources do not become the reasons for a lack of progress. We are not taking on the responsibility for progress. That is the responsibility of Ukrainian society leaders and institutions.”
Facing facts
When it comes to implementing reforms, Christensen has had first-hand experience of what Denmark will be up against. In the run-up to the launch of Ukraine’s asset declaration system, which ultimately went live in September, he was called to a meeting at the Ukrainian parliament, which he thought would be about Danish financial support for the initiative. Instead, he said he witnessed a “political attack” which validated his suspicions about how some within the establishment would react to efforts to foster democracy and transparency.
“This was my first blatant, personal experience of behavior of this kind,” the ambassador told the Kyiv Post. “I wouldn’t say that I was shocked, but it came very unexpectedly to me. I thought I was invited to have a friendly discussion about how to obtain Danish grants, but it turned out to be part of the whole discrediting campaign. It confirmed something we already knew – that vested interests are bound to resist.”
The issue of private concerns trumping the reform agenda is perhaps nowhere more pronounced than when it comes to Ukraine’s oligarchs, who control vast swathes of the economy and wield significant political power. Christensen told the Kyiv Post that the answer to this challenge, at least in theory, is clear.
“If you want to address that, you need to make sure that the elected representatives are in fact expressing the views of the population that elected them, rather than the people who finance them,” he said. “That’s a maturity process and can only be addressed by democratic development. There’s no quick fix.”
Voicing concerns
Part of the solution to the problem, according to the Danish ambassador, needs to come in the form of greater participation from the Ukrainian people. Denmark’s assistance program will seek to address this in the coming years through providing support for civil society groups and the media, both of which Copenhagen sees as essential if reforms are to stay on track.
Christensen says he would like to see the public speak out more boldly about corruption. This, in turn, would help to eliminate the debilitating lack of trust between citizens and state institutions that currently characterizes public life.
“Sometimes when I talk to Ukrainian friends I experience, besides the lack of trust, there’s also a slightly passive approach, waiting for changes to come,” Christensen told the Kyiv Post.
“I understand that results need to be seen, in the final instance, through convictions. I understand that and I’m not saying that is not important. But to be really successful in lowering the level of corruption in society you also need to address the social acceptance factor.
“You need to cry out loud. When you meet it, you need to make sure you join up with others who also experience it so that you are not singled out, and you need really to build the social momentum against corruption. Otherwise any institution will fail.”
