Kyiv, January 14, 2015 – The members of the Competition Committee, regarding the selection of the Head of the National Anti-corruption Bureau (NAB), strongly deny the possibility that their decisions are politically motivated. This was stated by the Competition Committee at Ukraine Crisis Media Center.
“As any other group of people, albeit having such an immense experience in the civil society field as the Committee members do, we still might make a mistake. But we do have time to correct mistakes. However, we will not allow anybody to exert pressure over us” stated Joseph Zissels, the Head of the Competition Committee.. He also emphasized that he would resign from the Committee if he faces attempted political pressure or manipulations while deciding on the candidates for the Head of the National Anti-corruption Bureau position.
Refat Chubarov, Head of the Committee, assumed that such an influence is possible, however, he never faced any such incidents while working in the Committee.
At the briefing, participants emphasized the necessity to immediately amend the law the Competition Committee’s extent of regulation of the NAB, as the current provisions are worded quite vaguely and might cause legal uncertainty. This, in particular, refers to the requirements on candidates’ work experience, citizenship, personal data verification, interview format, procedure of the candidates’ list submission to the President, and other issues.“practical work with this Law inspired us to develop the amendments upon our own initiative and suggest that someone vested with legislative initiative submits them to the Parliament for consideration”, said Chubarov. He stressed to need for the most expedient approval of such amendments. “f the amendments are not approved and we will encounter colliding provisions in the course of our work, we will be just unable to make a decision decision. But in any case, I’m sure, we will prevent any situation giving the grounds to appeal against the results of the Head of the NAB competitive selection in court», Yevhen Zakharov, the Committee Secretary, said
Competition Committee members refused to comment on when they might complete the list of candidates for the Head of the NAB position and submit the list to the President of Ukraine. However, Refat Chubarov suggested that under an optimistic scenario this will take place in less than two months. To ensure efficient communication with potential candidates the Committee members will promptly respond to any questions received via email. . “Our task is to keep the door open for the participation in the competition, we want to have as many candidates as possible in order to have a robust basis for selection,” said Committee member Joseph Zissels.
