The SBI searches of the Commission members coincided with the fact that you were supposed to conduct another stage of the qualification assessment of the judges of the Supreme Administrative Court of Ukraine — namely, Pavlo Vovk and Yevhen Ablov, who appeared on the NABU recordings, as well as the judges of the Pechersk Court, in particular, the Maidan judges Oksana Tsarevych and Serhiy Vovk. In simple terms, HQCJ must decide whether these compromised judges will be able to continue working: conduct meetings, make decisions. Do you see a connection between these events?
I am not aware of any facts that would indicate a connection. The proceedings that I know about (perhaps I don’t know about all of them) concerned a practical assignment [that Pavlo Vovk failed to complete]. Another proceeding concerns inquiries [regarding Judge Tsarevych] sent by one of the commission members.
As far as I know, a few more are related to the participation of close people in the appeal competition. That is, they are mostly related to the appeal competition.
And what could be the reason for such a large number of proceedings? And it’s not just about them. The parliament excludes internationals from the selection of members of the Supreme Judicial Council. Then they create a parliamentary TIC that should deal with law enforcement agencies, but instead it takes on the Supreme Judicial Council and its members threaten to forcibly bring to its meeting a member of the Supreme Judicial Council Serhiy Chumak, who remains a judge and (accordingly, cannot be brought by force). Then the head of the commission Serhiy Vlasenko files a criminal complaint specifically against you. It all looks like a planned operation and pressure from the authorities…
We feel this and make statements on this issue. We cannot forget about the fundamental principle of building a democratic state — the separation of powers. There is a judiciary. It must be independent. This is spelled out in the Constitution.
Accordingly, no other body of power — executive, legislative — has the right to control, revise, or interfere in the exercise of the powers of the judicial branch. HQCJ is part of the judicial branch.
If there is no independent HQCJ, how can we talk about independent judges?
Because a judge begins with the appointment procedure. That is, with our work. We must be independent so that we can appoint an independent judge who will then independently send to justice.
Therefore, any interference in the activities of the commission is a violation of the principle of the separation of powers. All members of the commission voted unanimously for this position. And it is this position that is the basis for our statements that interference is being carried out.
We believe that parliamentary control does not extend to the activities of the judicial branch.
Діма Вага / «Бабель»
Vlasenko says that despite the fact that the commissionʼs tasks refer to law enforcement agencies and courts, the name of the commission also mentions the judiciary...
And now Iʼm talking about the Constitution. I think the difference between the Basic Law and the name of TIC is obvious.
Then who on the part of the government could be interested in controlling HQCJ and, accordingly, controlling the judges who are elected to positions? It is clear who could be behind this?
I may have some assumptions, but I canʼt voice them for sure because I donʼt have any concrete evidence.
Do you communicate with anyone from the Presidentʼs Office? Previously, maybe with Andriy Smirnov, because he was in charge of the courts, and now with Oleh Tatarov?
I have never met them. I have communicated exclusively with Iryna Mudra, since she is in charge of judicial reform issues in the Office of the President. We meet and communicate with her periodically on judicial reform issues.
The Office of the President is developing a strategy for the development of the judiciary, so it is obvious that we are interested in discussing this document and conveying the position of the commission on what should be in this document regarding the commission. We are also discussing timelines.
Since the competition is actually concluded by a presidential decree, both the High Council of Justice and the Office of the President should know when we will send recommendations and plan their activities accordingly. During our term, the president has already signed decrees regarding more than 400 judges.
When you were invited to TIC, Vlasenko reported that you would be heard in closed session. Everyone was kicked out of the meeting, a recording was made, but the entire meeting was published a day later. Did they warn you that they decided to make the video of the closed session public?
No, of course not. Moreover, I was not even summoned as a witness. I was simply invited to speak as part of a normal dialogue between authorities. At least thatʼs how it looked and how I perceived it.
Were you not warned that this would effectively be an interrogation of you as a witness?
It wasnʼt written that I was a witness, it wasnʼt written that I was being questioned, they didnʼt explain my rights and obligations to me, they didnʼt warn me about the right to a lawyer — nothing. It was stated that the hearing would be closed, and then for some reason it became open.
Serhiy Vlasenkoʼs TIC also includes other opponents of judicial reform and the participation of international experts in competitive selections — MPs Maksym Buzhanskyi and Hryhorii Mamka.
Тимчасова слідча комісія
Why did the commission address HQCJ now?
It’s hard for me to say. I can only assume, but I’m afraid I’m wrong. We’re working effectively — we’ve already considered several hundred questions about the suitability of judges for their positions, we’re actively conducting interviews in the appellate instance.
There are recommendations for many local courts, some of them were on the verge, because there were almost no judges left. These days, qualifying exams are being held for candidates for the Higher Judicial and Administrative Court.
And in February and March, interviews will be held for these candidates together with a public council of international experts. We’ve now announced competitions for specialized administrative courts.
We’re preparing for this procedure.
Letʼs talk about the competition for judges of the Specialized District Administrative Court and the Specialized Appeal Administrative Court. These courts were created instead of KDAC. They will have exclusive powers, and their decisions will influence the political life of the country. Obviously, a lot of attention will be paid to you, and it is possible that you will be pressured because of this competition. So, maybe this is just artillery preparation?
I donʼt know of any facts that would indicate this. And again, I donʼt want to put forward any theories or assumptions either.
There is another big complaint against the members of HQCJ. This is the participation in competitions of relatives of members of the High Qualification Commission, members of the Supreme Judicial Council, relatives of members of the Supreme Judicial Council. Separately, in certain Telegram channels, which constantly criticize the judicial reform after Yanukovychʼs escape, they also mention your assistant Raimov, who won the competition for the position of judge of the Commercial Court...
He is not an assistant, he is a commission inspector.
Inspector of the Supreme Judicial Council Ruslan Raimov is one of the favorites in the competition for the position of judge of the Administrative Court of Appeal.
ВККС / Facebook
Okay. In any case, the participation of relatives and acquaintances of the commission members in the competition looks suspicious. What safeguards did you use to prevent this conflict of interest?
It is important here that you do not get the impression that this is some kind of systemic phenomenon. Because this is exactly the perception that they are manipulatively trying to impose.
2 076 contestants applied for the competition. Of these, only two people — family members or close relatives of the commission members — received a recommendation from HQCJ.
And how many relatives were there in total?
4. In the selection process for the courts of first instance, which is currently underway, three close people of the commission members did not pass — they did not overcome some barriers, did not pass one stage or another. Several inspectors of the commission members also did not pass. My other inspector (not Raimov) also did not pass the barrier, unfortunately.
Therefore, this is not a system.
Secondly, from the very beginning we turned to NAPC and the Council of Judges of Ukraine, which, by law, explain how to act to prevent a conflict of interest. We acted in accordance with these explanations. No member of the commission made any decisions regarding their relatives, acquaintances, or inspectors. Everyone was dismissed at the stages recommended to us by the NACP or the Council of Judges of Ukraine.
In addition, we specially published all the test tasks and answers to them, as well as 20 legal positions of the Supreme Court for the practical task, so that everyone was on the same terms. And the cognitive tests were prepared and conducted by another organization, whose services were paid for by our international partners. They only gave us the result.
By the way, this also causes criticism, because both test tasks and 20 positions can be memorized, but this does not reveal real knowledge, the ability to analyze, etc....
You are partly right, but we weighed the risks of the first and second approaches and came to the conclusion that it was more important for us to ensure the fairness of this competition.
We ensured it in this way.
Contestants draw numbers from a bowl and take their places during the test. The committee members do not know whose work they are checking.
ВККС / Facebook
But the competition also consists of an interview, which has the same weight as all previous competitions. And even if a committee member does not consider his relative, the other committee members know that it is his relative. How can an independent approach be guaranteed here?
There are 400 points that a person can get based on the results of the interview. How are they distributed? They can get one hundred points for personal and social competence. Three hundred points are ethics and integrity.
According to our regulations, we presume that everyone who comes to us is honest. But we have changed the approach to the calculation: we do not add points, we subtract them. This ensures an equal approach to all candidates.
According to the regulations, we can deduct 15 points for one or several minor violations. And each time we motivate this in the decision so that each candidate understands why we are deducting points. This can be appealed in court.
Plus, there is a public integrity council (PIC). These are 20 independent people from various public organizations. PIC receives all the judgesʼ dossiers in advance, analyzes them, regardless of whether they are relatives of members of HQCJ or not. And then they give a conclusion.
I don’t want to dwell on all the TIC questions about the competitions — some sounded strange, but there was one question specifically about you. Vlasenko said that you were on sick leave for a week, and then in 10 minutes you entered the grades for the contestants’ practical work into the system, that’s too fast. You explained that you read the works in printed form during the week. TIC raised many questions, for example, who printed them out for you. You refused to answer, referring to the Constitution. As a result, Vlasenko filed a complaint with the State Bureau of Investigation about a crime, which was classified as interference in the work of information systems. Why did you refuse to answer who printed the works? Were you supposed to read them in the system?
Well, look. I came to work, turned on the computer. Do you think there is a document that allows me to turn on the computer? No. You need to be guided by logic and common sense. It is impossible to standardize everything that a person does at his workplace. The software provides the ability to print — there is a "print" button. We use it. I do not see any problems with this.
Now I will need to check over 400 works for the competition for the selection of judges in the first instance. It is difficult to read four hundred works on a monitor. They are also difficult to read on paper, but it is obvious that it is more convenient to work with paper.
Therefore, I will continue to use this functionality. It is absolutely legal, provided for by the program. I emphasize that all works are anonymous. No member of the Commission knows and cannot find out whose work he is checking. Therefore, it does not matter at all whether the work is printed or not.
I don’t understand why they ask who printed it. And I’ll just add context: according to the Ukraine Facility plan, our commission, together with the Supreme Court of Justice, was supposed to fill at least 20% of vacancies in the judicial branch of government by September of this year.
If we don’t do this, several hundred million euros will not be received by the Ukrainian budget. Therefore, without exaggeration, every day mattered, and we made every effort to complete the competition on time. The commission fulfilled its obligations and completed its part of the work in August.
After Pasichnykʼs interrogation at the TIC meeting, the head of the commission Serhiy Vlasenko filed a criminal complaint with the State Bureau of Investigation. HQCJ believes that TICʼs actions amounted to pressure.
Діма Вага / «Бабель»