Kiev, Ukraine. The Poroshenko administration must think everyday is Christmas as grant follows grant, tranche follows tranche and free money flows like water into the US client corruption state. The latest sees another $10 million from the EU for a “better administration.”
The European Union allocated Ukraine the first tranche amounting to €10 million in the context of the EU program to “support a thorough reform of the state administration in Ukraine”, the press service of the Ukrainian Cabinet of Ministers reported. The EU has been pleading for the last 3 years for the Poroshenko Administration to crack down on corruption, with a system to prosecute such offenses.
The European partners noted that they highly appreciate the government’s efforts to reform the state administration, and noted the presence of a political will to implement these changes,” the report states. But that is a Ukrainian report and when you review the EU threats to cut off Ukraine from billions of dollars in promised free money, it becomes clear that a game of chicken between Kiev and Brussels is underway, when it comes to putting a corruption court in motion and not just talk of one.
The Kiev report notes that at the government session on April 26, Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman announced massive reforms of the state service, including radical reformation of the Cabinet of Ministers, which has nothing to do with prosecution of corruption cases which threaten to cost Ukraine up to $20 Billion dollars in aid money over the next two years. Brussels is demanding Groysman focus on real reform and not talking points on non-sense with pensions and farmland.
In November 2016, the EU transferred three tranches to Ukraine amounting to $54 million dollars, to support the reform in the area of decentralization, transport and technological standardization in Ukraine.
In April 2017, the EU allocated Ukraine a second tranche of macro-financial aid amounting to $600 million, with a provision that Kiev must stop it’s corruption problem or simply face the free money faucet being turned off, with no further notice.