‘Lockdown competitions’ for civil service, withdrawal from CIS agreement, and appointments in the judiciary — new decisions by Cabinet and President

11 August 2020
‘Lockdown competitions’ for civil service, withdrawal from CIS agreement, and appointments in the judiciary — new decisions by Cabinet and President
Home > Monitoring > ‘Lockdown competitions’ for civil service, withdrawal from CIS agreement, and appointments in the judiciary — new decisions by Cabinet and President

While the Parliament is on vacation, the Government and the President continue to work for the good of the country.

New ‘lockdown competitions’ for civil service started

Decision-maker: the Cabinet.

Who is affected: applicants for civil service competitions, civil servants, ministers, and the Cabinet.

What does it change: the Government has announced competitions for the following positions in civil service:

  • first deputy head of the State Service for Geodesy, Cartography and Cadastre
  • deputy head of the State Service for Geodesy, Cartography and Cadastre (three positions: 1, 2, 3)
  • head of the State Service of Ukraine for Transport Safety
  • deputy head of the State Service of Special Communication and Information Protection.

What is wrong:

  • competitions during the lockdown are reduced to job interviews with candidates, and that does not help building independent and apolitical high-quality civil service. Without proper competitions, candidates with connections could be chosen over candidates with better skills and knowledge
  • if the Parliament will vote for presidential proposals on civil service (to know more, check our previous digest), all personnel appointed during lockdown will be retained in their positions without ever going through a real competition.

Ukraine terminates one more CIS agreement

Decision-maker: the Cabinet.

Who is affected: the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Cabinet, the President, and Ukrainian state border guards.

What does it change: Ukraine has terminated an agreement On cooperation between border guard services of the Commonwealth of Independent States on scientific research activities.

What is right: Ukraine has less obligations to the CIS, an international organization aiming at keeping post-Soviet countries together in politics, economics, culture, science, and other spheres.

Why this is important:

  • Ukraine breaks its ties not just to the CIS, but also to the aggressor state of Russia. Moscow dominates the CIS and uses it to press Russian interests
  • withdrawal from the agreement is consistent with current state policy. Not long ago, the Cabinet terminated the memorandum with Russia on cooperation on fighting terrorism and submitted a draft bill to the Parliament asking to terminate the agreement on cooperation with the CIS on consistent antimonopoly policy and several other issues. In July, the President passed a decree to terminate a CIS agreement on anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism.

Zelensky appointed local trial court judges

Decision-maker: the President.

Who is affected: Ukrainian citizens, candidates for judicial appointments, judges, and judicial self-governing bodies.

What does it change: 90 judges have been appointed to local trial courts.

Why this is important:

  • according to the Deputy Head of the Supreme Court Bohdan Lvov, 69 local courts cannot function properly because of the shortage of judges, at oblast level the shortage has reached 40%
  • courts are overworked and people are deprived of the right of access to justice. Cases like administrative violations sometimes are not heard at all.