More than 70% of Ukrainians are certain that the corruption rate has not decreased, and the authorities do not want to expose bribe-takers.
The Global Corruption Barometer 2016 research, prepared by the international anticorruption organization Transparency International and published on November 16, contains such data.
The survey was conducted in 42 countries of Europe and Central Asia from November 2015 to July 2016. In Ukraine, 1,507 respondents participated in the survey.
56% of Ukrainian consider that the corruption is one the major problems in the country; almost half has no doubt that oligarchs impact governmental decisions in the country.
86% of the surveyed negatively assessed the attempts of Ukrainian authorities to eradicate corruption.
Most of bribe-takers, according to Ukrainians, are among state officials (65%), people’s deputies (64%), tax officials (62%), judges (61%) and police officials (54%).
60% of the surveyed said that the President and Prime Minister are corrupt. The last place in the ranking is occupied by religious leaders (32%).
As noted in the survey, Ukrainians are used to corruption in the daily life.
For the last year, they most often paid bribes in kindergartens and schools (38%), in healthcare facilities (33%), representatives of the road police (33%) as well as in the sphere of social protection.
Though the third of Ukrainians is ready to reject the bribe-taker, 42% of the surveyed consider that they should not report the fact of corruption to respective bodies: some people consider that this will change nothing, others are afraid of the consequences of such exposure.
It is reported that in Russia, where the high-profile corruption scandal more often erupt, only 39% of respondents said that this phenomenon is the major state problem and almost half of the surveyed negatively assessed the attempts of authorities to overcome corruption.
Transparency International Ukraine’s Executive Director Yaroslav Yurchishin explained in comments to DW that “the great attention of people to corruption scandals, many of which Ukraine currently has, creates impression that the corruption rate increased, however, in fact, the corruption of many years just became evident, it started being exposed”.
In Kyiv office of Transparency International, they note that the survey was conducted before the launch of e-declaration system in Ukraine, but they consider that currently the results would not significantly differ.
“The survey always has the subjective factor, that is why, if the survey is conducted after publication of e-declarations, then the disappointment in government actions could be even bigger”, Yurchyshyn considers.
However, he emphasized that until now, “Ukraine did not have any anti-corruption progress”.
