corruption_in_ukraine_2007-2009_2011_engl

Corruption within the State Auto Inspection (SAI) agency

TheshareofrespondentswhocameintocontactwithSAIrepresentativesoverthelast12months,whichincreased from 19.7% in 2007 to 23.2% in 2009, remained at the same level in 2011 (23.7%). There remains a significant share of respondents who encountered corruption in this sphere.

As earlier, the most typical form of corruption practiced by the SAI is unofficial payments made to SAI employees for violating traffic rules: approximately 42% of those who committed traffic violations were extorted for bribes and this is significantly higher compared to the 35% in 2009 (a statistically significant difference at the level of p=0.001), while the share of drivers who initiated bribes decreased from 23% in 2009 to 20.5%.

Another important reason for contacting SAI with regard to which share of extortion increased was passing technical inspection of a vehicle: 25.2% in 2011 versus 19% in 2009.

Charts 5.18 refer to the respondents who had contacted workers of the SAI within 12 months prior to the interview (n (2007) = 2087; n (2009) = 2451; n (2011) = 2522).

																																Chart 5.18
													Corruption at SAI
										Question: Were you forsed to…
… pay unofficially to SAI									…pay unofficially for					…pay unofficially							… pay unofficially						…pay unofficially
worker when you violated									conducting “correct”																			for passing
															for receiving/ re-						for receiving/ re-
traffic rules?									examination at the																			technical
														regestering driving									regestering car
										accident?																	examination of the
																	license?							permission?
																															car?
No – and					28,9%								77,5%							66,2%						72,8%								55,1%
nobody
						34,1%						76,0%							64,3%							72,1%								57,8%
forced me					29,3%						72,7%							63,3%							68,3%								47,1%
No – but I										1,2%					2,9%							2,4%						2,5%								2007
		2,5%
		3,7%								2,7%					3,5%							2,7%						3,1%
was forced
		4,4%								3,7%				2,2%								3,3%						3,6%								2009
Yes – I did										4,9%						9,8%							6,3%								19,2%					2011
				24,8%
it on my own				23,2%						5,4%						12,1%							7,9%						15,0%
			20,5%							5,4%						11,2%							8,4%								19,3%
Yes – I was										7,5%							16,1%							10,7%							17,6%
							38,3%
forced						35,0%				9,4%							16,0%							11,6%							19,0%
								41,9%		11,2%							18,0%							13,7%								25,2%

The rest of the changes are insignificant: as earlier, 18% of drivers were forced to pay to obtain a driver’s licenses or when taking technical exams, while 14% were forced to pay to have their vehicle registered. Another 11% are pressedto“finance”falseresultsoftechnicalinspectionofthevehicle.Voluntarybribe-givingislesscommonthan extortions in reference to all mentioned occasions. Overall, corruption within the SAI sphere remains widespread and typical and obviously its existence is reinforced by SAI employees as much as it is by drivers.

Contrary to other government funded sectors, such as healthcare and education, citizens express no sympathy to SAI employees and therefore propose application of punitive measures to curb corruption in this body.

5.CITIZENS’EXPERIENCES WITH CORRUPTION

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Steps to Reduce Corruption at SAI

To enforce administrative and criminal responsibility for corruption

Tofirethoseexposedincorruptionfromwork

withfutureprohibitiononprofessionalactivity

To raise professional level and conduct more strict professional recruitment of the SAI workers

To raise the salaries to the ordinary SAI workers

Introduce 100% o cial payments for all the services through the cash desk

28,2%

20,7% 19,9%

26,5%

18,7%

18,4%

Chart 5.19

60,8%

70,9%

63,5%

61,5%

69,4%

63,6%

43,5%

48,0%

45,0%

2007 2009

2011

Question: What steps in your opinion should be made to curb corruption in the system of SAI?

Also, the share of those who see stricter sanctions as the best way to reduce corruption has slightly decreased. As in earlier years, the majority of respondents supported firing those involved in corruption with further prohibition of professional activity (63.6%) and stricter administrative and criminal liability for acts of corruption (63.5%).

Inaddition,driverssuggestthatmoreattentionshouldbepaidtotheselectionprocessofSAIemployees(45%)and only then salaries may be raised for SAI workers (20%). Generally speaking, the hierarchy of suggestions remains unchanged.

5.CITIZENS’EXPERIENCES WITH CORRUPTION

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6. CITIZEN RESPONSES TO CORRUPTION

Filing complaints and standing up for one’s rights

While the share of citizens that file complaints against corrupt officials remains extremely low, it varies on a year- to-yearbasis.Over12monthsprecedingthelastsurvey,averysmallshareofcorruptionvictimswhowereextorted (4.1%) officially filed complaints against the authorities This is more than results of findings in the 2009 survey (2.7%) and almost equal to what was revealed in 2007 (4.3%). The practice of filing complaints with government authorities or law enforcement agencies related to corruption continues to be quite uncommon. The reasons for not filing complaints remain the same as before: a majority of the people feels that filing a complaint is futile (55%), while about one-quarter (21%) feel there was no need to do so.

Chart 6.1

Reasons for not Complaining about Corruption Experience

								50,5%
It was futile											56,5%
											55,4%
							21,1%
In was not necessary							21,9%
							20,7%
			8,0%
It was not safe			7,3%							2007
			7,9%							2009
						20,4%
Other										2011
				14,3%
					16,0%

Question: What was the reason for not filing a complaint?

Onlyone-thirdofUkrainiansarebecomingmorewillingtostandupfortheirrights(34.1%).Therefore,weobserve nosignificantprogressinthedevelopmentofacivilsociety,althoughin2009theshareofthosewhowerereadyto activelycountercorruptionincreasedto35.9%from33.2%in2007.Ontheotherhand,nearlyasmanyrespondents as earlier (33% in 2007 and nearly 34% in 2009 and 2011) stated they were not ready to defend their rights.

The socio-demographic portrait of a typical corruption fighter remains unchanged. The majority of those who most often declare they are ready to fight against corrupt officials are males, young people, as well as welleducatedandwealthycitizens.Thesearethesamegroupsthatdemonstratedthehighestscoresintheperception and experience indices. This tends to confirm the conclusions of the previous surveys that the more a person experiences corruption, the more they demonstrate their willingness to fight against it.

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6. CITIZEN RESPONSES TO CORRUPTION

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						Chart 6.29
			Citizens Believe They are Ready to Stand for Their Rights
	60%
	50%
	40,1%	39,2%			41,1%	Age
	40%		34,8%
		32,4%	33,7%		37,3%	Education
			32,6%
	30%	31,4%				Income
	28,7%
	20%			22,7%
	17,8%
	10%
	0%				Increasing levels of education,
	1	2	3	4
					income and age (by quartile)

Unfortunately, the most tangible change in citizens’ responses to what they would actually do to defend their rights,isanincrease(from30.8%to32.9%)intheshareofthosewhosaidtheywouldnotdoanything(astatistically significant difference at the level of p=0.001). This is followed by a decrease in the number of citizens, who said they would appeal to a court or law enforcement bodies (from 19.6% to 17.6%).

Atthesametime,thepeople’sreadinesstoparticipateindemonstrationsorprotestsinordertodefendtheirrights is waning – the low share of people willing to participate in demonstrations decreased further from 8.4% to 6.8%. No other changes in responses to this question were noted. As earlier, 7% of respondent admitted they would try to reach an informal agreement with an official.

Chart 6.3

Measures You Would Take to Stand for Your Rights

Do nothing													27,7%
															30,8%
Demand rights from																	32,9%
												26,7%
o cials												26,7%
												26,7%
Complain to supervisor											22,8%
										22,3%
Apply to enforcement											22,9%
									20,7%
bodies or court								19,6%
							17,6%
Come to agreement					8,0%											2007
uno cially			6,9%
			7,1%													2009
Participate in		6,0%
						8,4%										2011
demonstrations
			6,8%
Seek help from NGO			6,7%
				7,2%
				6,6%

Question: In what way are you ready to act when a state official coarsely violates your rights?

The main reason for inactivity in cases of corruption remains the lack of certainty that such actions will truly have thedesiredeffect.This notion is maintained bytwothirds (67.2%)of respondentswho arenot readytocommit to any kind of action to stand up for their rights.

9 Quartiles by age are: I. 18-29 years old; II. 30-44 years old; III. 45-59 years old; IV. 60 years old and older

Quartilesbyeducationare:I.Elementaryorsomesecondary;II.Highschoolorvocationalschool;III.Highspecialized;IV.Universityundergraduateorgraduate

Quartiles by income are: I. Less than 1000 UAH; II. From 1000 to 1500 UAH; III. From 1500 to 2500 UAH; IV. More than 2500 UAH

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Given the low expectations as to the effectiveness of efforts in the fight against corruption, participants of focus group discussions showed a low level of readiness to even start the discussion. The conclusion derived from the qualitative survey is the following: the need to fight corruption arises only when a person is victimized by a bribe-taker, all the more if the extorted bride is considered “unfair.” In other instances this wouldbeanineffectivewasteofefforts.Generally,fightingagainstcorruptiononindividuallevelisperceived as something impractical and a risky adventure with no chances of victory.

“To complain or not to complain? Why would I care about complaints? Why should I waste my time and energy?”

“Ibelievethatthis alsodependsonaperson.Ifapersonwantstoaccomplishsomething,thepersondoesso, albeit in this case at the cost of his or her well-being. One should think hard whether it makes sense to risk it at all?”

“You don’t bear responsibility only for yourself. You’ve got to care about your children, family and parents”. “This is like dashing against a rock. Lack of confidence in one’s capabilities to do so

“Answering you previous question, I would rather say that I wouldn’t fight against corruption, because to me this little thing is convenient»

“Well, voices of ordinary people, who are not gainfully employed and are not climbing the career ladder, in principle will not be heard. It is like a dog barking, for example.”

“I personally have no time for that. If I keep going every day to complain, I will lose my job. Like I have an appointment today - please come tomorrow.”

“Let’s take, for example, education... If a teacher clearly extorts a bribe from me, either with his actions or verbally, but I know the subject and I can pass the exam without a bribe, they won’t let me go. In this case, some kind of justice must be sought against such a teacher.”

Effectiveness of anticorruption programs

Were there changes in public awareness of anti-corruption programs implemented by different organizations and did the perception of their effectiveness change? As was observed in earlier sections, analysis of the survey findings confirms the credit of trust given by the population to the incumbent President of Ukraine regarding the fight against corruption.

Compared to 2009, the share of citizens who heard at least something about measures applied by the President’s Secretariat to curtail the level of corruption has increased from 19.3% to 32.6%. Thus, for the first time, more citizens learned about the President’s initiatives than about corruption exposures presented by the mass media (30.2%).

In addition, parliament members apparently speak more in public about anti-corruption measures, driving the share of public awareness about the Verkhovna Rada’s activities up from 18.7% to 23.7%. Finally, twice as many citizensheardabouttheanti-corruptionactivitiesofprivatebusinesses(10.5%vs.5.1%in2009).Awarenessofthe Cabinet of Ministers’ activity, regardless of changes in its membership, remains at the previous level (21.5%) and the same is true for other organizations and institutions.

Has public awareness of organized anti-corruption programs increased and have citizens begun to evaluate the effectiveness of these programs differently? Partially, the response to this question is a yes, and this is true for the majority of the surveyed officials and bodies, mainly the President of Ukraine (from 2.7% to 9.7%) and the mass media (from 10.8% to 15.3%). It should also be emphasized that no more than 17.6% of respondents describe any anti-corruptionmeasuresinUkraineaseffectiveandthatthispercentagewasderivedfromthenumberofcitizens aware of such programs.

On the other hand, there is no agent with regard to which citizens believe that the effectiveness of these anticorruption activities has been declining. The only exception to this is private businesses, whose anti-corruption activity is perceived as having a declarative nature: despite a significant growth of public awareness about the anti-corruption measures on the part of private businesses, the assessment of their effectiveness has dwindled.

6. CITIZEN RESPONSES TO CORRUPTION

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6. CITIZEN RESPONSES TO CORRUPTION

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Chart 6.4

Awareness about and Effectivenes of Anticorruption Programs

Mass Media

Cabinet of Ministers

President and

Secretariat

Verkhovna Rada

Civil Society and

NGOs

City / Village

Government

Oblast Government

Private Sector

Awareness about Anticorruption															Effectiveness of
										Programs
														Anticorruption Programs
												29,6%												13,7%
												27,2%												10,8%
												30,2%													15,3%
							18,9%												8,9%
									21,7%
																	4,5%
									21,5%								5,9%
									20,9%									8,1%
									19,3%
													32,6%			2,7%
																				9,7%										2007
								19,3%														11,3%
								18,7%									5,9%													2009
										23,7%									9,1%
						12,7%																			14,3%					2011
						10,4%															11,0%
					11,1%																			13,7%
				10,5%																								22,1%
				9,0%																							17,0%
			10,0%																								17,6%
				10,2%																			12,4%
				8,3%													5,1%
			9,9%															8,4%								15,6%
	5,6%
	5,1%																									13,0%
				10,5%																			11,9%

Question: 1) Are you aware of any anti-corruption activities, reforms, or campaigns that have been implemented (organized) over the past 12 months by any of the following entities?

2) How effective were these activities?

A qualitative survey revealed a low level of public awareness about the government’s actions and organized fight against corruption. The development and adoption of anti-corruption legislation is perceived with distrust and considered an ineffective means of reducing the level of corruption. Respondents were rather skepticalabout theprospectsoffightingcorruption both atthestateand individual levels.Respondentsvest the highest probability of reducing corruption in business entities:

“Asystemischangedbythepeople.Andthepeoplethatworkinthatsystemtodayareitsoriginators.Evenif they did not give birth to it, they bolstered it”.

“Itisdifficultherebecauseourgovernmentbenefitsfromitinthefirstplace.Thegovernmentiswelloffwhen there is a shadow economy”.

“In business, it seems to be more realistic.”

Anticorruption measures

UkrainiansareconvincedthatimmunitystatusofmembersofparliamentisthestumblingblockpreventingUkraine from effective implementation of reforms in the fight against corruption. People believe that stripping deputies of theirimmunitystatusisthemosteffectivewayoffightingcorruption.Itistruethattheshareofcitizensconvinced intheeffectivenessofthismeasureisgraduallydecreasing,however,itisstillonethirdoftherespondents(32.2%).

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Chart 6.5

Measures that are Most Likely to be Effective in Fighting Corruption

Remove immunity from Rada deputies

Enforce criminal sanctions for corruption

Fire corrupt o cials and ban them in the future

Better define authority of o cials and improve controls

Improve laws and regulations

Other (improve citizens' legal literacy, investigations and prosecutions, and citizen watchdogs; impose monetary fines)

36,3%

35,8% 32,2%

14,9%

15,7%

15,4%

9,4%

13,2%

					13,1%
				11,1%
			9,0%
		8,2%					2007
							2009
	7,1%
	7,5%						2011
			9,0%

21,2%

18,8% 22,1%

Question: Which of the listed below measures in your opinion might be the most effective in curbing and preventing

corruption?

Overall, the palette of proposed measures remains unchanged. Stripping of deputy immunity status is followed by more radical measures such as strengthening criminal liability for corruption (15.4%), dismissal of corrupt officials and prohibiting them from working in other government jobs (13.1%).

Therefore, the survey findings are testimony to the fact that lately the idea of intensifying strict measures against corrupt officials is becoming less popular among Ukrainians. At the same time, such less radical and more progressive activities as modifying and improving legislation and, what is more important, enhancing the level of public legal awareness and introducing public control are gaining popularity. This is true with respect to both reducing corruption in individual sectors and overcoming this phenomenon in society at large.

Findingsofthequalitativesurveycorroboratequantitativedata.Therespondents’firstspontaneousresponse with regard to the means of reducing corruption – ranging from perplexity and impossibility to fighting corruption to the use of violent methods – is followed by more reasonable ideas such as transparency of the work of state officials, public declaration of their incomes, public law suits against corrupt officials, and, finally, raising public awareness about measures to fight corruption and the results:

“We are more down-to-earth people, all we are capable of doing is gathering in the smoking area and proclaiming “what an old git!”.

“We do not see a way out of this situation”.

“There are no remedies, because both the government and the prosecutor’s office are involved…» “Only through physical liquidation by means of a riot or a revolution”.

“Transparency of their work just as they install see-through doors in militsiya precincts. Or make their work known to the public”.

“More programs on this subject in the mass media, on TV and so on; different discussions, more “success stories”.Sothatpeoplehearaboutthem.Andplentyofoptions,astheycomeout,progresswillbeachieved.”

“I think there must be some public awareness programs, so that people become aware of their rights and know who they can contact when their rights are flouted. Our people do not know their rights. A person is beingextortedandhasnocluethattheycanfileacomplaintwithahigherrankinginstitutionandwhatother measures are available…”

“Clearly, information should be disseminated, so that people have no fear.”

6. CITIZEN RESPONSES TO CORRUPTION

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