Vitaly Yarema
At the end of this article, I'll give a completely clear answer to the question posed in the title. In the meantime, let's recall the names of the heads of the Prosecutor General's Office of Ukraine over the past 15 years:
— Potebenko Mikhail Alekseevich (July 17, 1998 – April 30, 2002)
— Piskun Svyatoslav Mikhailovich (July 6, 2002 – October 29, 2003; December 10, 2004 – October 14, 2005; April 26 – May 24, 2007)
— Vasiliev Gennady Andreevich (November 18, 2003 - December 9, 2004)
— Medvedko Alexander Ivanovich (November 4, 2005 – April 26, 2007; June 1, 2007 – November 3, 2010)
— Shemchuk Viktor Viktorovich (acting from May 24 to June 1, 2007)
— Pshonka Viktor Pavlovich (November 4, 2010 – February 22, 2014)
— Makhnitsky Oleg Igorevich (Acting February 24 – June 18, 2014)
— Yarema Vitaly Grigorievich (since June 19, 2014).
We will exclude Shimchuk and Makhnitsky from consideration, since they served as heads of the Prosecutor General's Office for a very short time, and, moreover, were only acting.
Well, everyone else from the above list, in short, are either complete scoundrels, or extremely ineffective Prosecutors General, or both.
I won't discuss Potebenko, Piskun, Vasilyev, Medvedko, and Pshonka now, as they've already been the subject of a ton of negative media coverage. I'll focus in more detail on the most recent one, the current Prosecutor General, Yarema. He's already become one of the worst of all the aforementioned Prosecutors General.
First, let me remind you of two shameful circumstances concerning Yarema, which were widely covered back in September. https://www.facebook.com/238703292929302/photos/pb.238703292929302.-2207520000.1416251060./546128128853482/?type=3&theater
The case at the time concerned Deputy Prosecutor General Anatoly Danilenko, who, together with his son, fraudulently acquired 140 hectares of land and water bodies. When journalists uncovered the matter and reported it in the media, Yarema began actively defending his deputy.
The second, no less shameful, fact involves the 26-year-old son of the Prosecutor General. Despite his youth, Valeriy Vitaliyovych Yarema managed to secure a high-ranking and lucrative position. He became the head of the Department of State Registration of Real Estate Rights at the Central Office of the State Registration Service of Ukraine.
I'll also recall the words of renowned public figure Yuriy Butusov, addressed to the Prosecutor General in September. "Yarema's actions are far more vile than the scams of Yanukovych's henchmen. Because you, Mr. Yarema, didn't earn your position with money, but with the blood of hundreds of dead. Because the country buries its defenders every day—hundreds upon hundreds. And you, a well-protected backroom official, haven't jailed a single scoundrel who plundered the country, and you're covering for your friend, who, just like Yanukovych, registered a whole 140 hectares of land in his son's name," the editor-in-chief of Censor.net declared at the time.
Now I will provide several assessments, expressed quite recently by another well-known activist regarding other circumstances related to the activities of the current Prosecutor General.
"Vitaliy Yarema. Transformation into Pshonka"—that's how Sergei Ivanov eloquently titled his article in Ukrainska Pravda. https://blogs.pravda.com.ua/authors/ivanov/546a3111cde93/
"As expected, Vitaliy Yarema, who used the Maidan to transform himself from a retired policeman into prosecutor general, turned into Pshonka much faster than Pshonka turned into himself," is the merciless characterization he gave Yarema in this publication.
Ivanov's article details the Prosecutor General's Office's complete failure to respond to the publication of facts indicating gross falsifications committed by specific members of specific electoral commissions during the recent parliamentary elections.
This article also talks about Yarema’s appointment of former “Yanukovych’s people” to high positions in the Prosecutor General’s Office.
In particular, regarding the appointment of customs officer Orlov (with the informative nickname "Vova-transit") to the position of head of the procedural management department.
The article also reports that Mykola Gerasimyuk, who served as Deputy Prosecutor General of the State Executive Service in the agency until April of this year, has assumed the position of First Deputy Prosecutor General – Head of the Main Directorate for the Protection of Citizens' Rights and Freedoms, State Interests, and Oversight of Special Forces and Other Agencies Combating Organized Crime and Corruption. Lavrinovich.
Ivanov also reported “about another Pshonkin-Yaremin creature – the Kyiv city prosecutor Yuldashev.”
However, as the activist points out in his publication, "the real peak of Yarema's infamy came today, when he, having entered into a criminal conspiracy with judges of the Supreme Court of Ukraine, attempted to undermine the lustration law – a normative act that was adopted with such difficulty and is vitally necessary for Ukraine."
I'd also like to draw attention to an article Yarema himself wrote and published in the latest issue of the weekly "Mirror of the Week." https://gazeta.zn.ua/internal/spisok-spravedlivosti-_.html
In it, the Prosecutor General, likely aware of the extremely negative public attitude toward him, began to justify his inaction over the past five months. He writes in the article about how much work he has, how he is being hampered from all sides, and so on and so forth.
But just look at this sentence from Yarema's article! "One of the top spots on the 'Justice List' is the investigation into large-scale embezzlement of budget funds. The Prosecutor General's Office has opened more than 30 criminal cases against V. Yanukovych, N. Azarov, S. Arbuzov, E. Stavytsky, A. Klymenko, N. Prysyazhnyuk, Yu. Kolobova, R. Bogatyreva. They have all also been notified of suspicion of committing criminal offenses, and a search has been issued for them," he writes.
As you can see, only those who fled Ukraine long ago and, therefore, the Ukrainian Prosecutor General's Office can no longer "get" are listed here. But why, I ask, isn't Mr. Boyko at the top of this list? The former Deputy Prime Minister for Energy, who profited by buying oil rigs from Riga homeless people at double the price? And who never fled Ukraine, but will now become a member of parliament, and even the head of the Opposition Bloc faction? And why aren't many other "former" figures on this list, those who haven't yet fled the country and, it seems, have no intention of fleeing anywhere, now that they feel completely safe under the new government and the new Prosecutor General?
Moreover, Yarema said nothing in his article about his corrupt deputy Danilenko, about other “questionable” personnel, about his son, who had achieved excessive career success, and so on.
In short, I hope it's clear to everyone by now that Yarema has proven, to put it mildly, to be an extremely poor Prosecutor General. Not a single high-ranking official of the former regime has been arrested. Also, no one has yet been held accountable for the mass murder of Ukrainian patriots on the Maidan! However, Yarema has managed to completely discredit himself in a short period of time with personnel appointments, shielding his dishonest friends, and other unsavory activities. For all of this, he should undoubtedly be immediately removed from his post as Prosecutor General and never again be entrusted with any high-ranking position.
And finally, as promised, I'll answer why we're so unlucky with our Prosecutors General. The answer, however, is obvious.
According to our Constitutions (both the current one and the 1996 version), the appointment and dismissal of the Prosecutor General are the prerogative of the President. Specifically, according to Article 122 of the Constitution, the Prosecutor General of Ukraine is appointed by the President of Ukraine with the consent of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. The President personally removes him from office. This does not require the consent of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine.
Consequently, our President chooses his own Prosecutor General and, if necessary, can remove him himself. In other words, our Prosecutor General is completely dependent on the President and, naturally, is perfectly aware of this.
In this regard, one could say this: tell me what kind of Prosecutor General you have, and I'll tell you what kind of President you have. Or, to put it another way: we're unlucky with Prosecutors General because we're unlucky with Presidents.
As for the qualities of Petro Oleksiyovych, which have already clearly manifested themselves during his almost six-month presidency, I agree with the assessment expressed last Saturday by Yulia Latynina that Poroshenko is an old “political animal” incapable of reforms! https://www.facebook.com/238703292929302/photos/pb.238703292929302.-2207520000.1416298757./568333839966244/?type=3&theater
Incidentally, for the past 14 years, the Gongadze case has been considered a tacit test of the abilities and integrity of the Prosecutor Generals. The aim is to identify and bring to justice those who actually ordered Gongadze's murder. Meanwhile, no one has long doubted that Major Melnichenko's tapes are genuine. And, accordingly, that Kuchma and Lytvyn, respectively, ordered and instigated the journalist's murder.
But look who Poroshenko recently appointed as Ukraine's chief negotiator in Minsk on the Donbas issue? Leonid Kuchma! What can we even say about the current Prosecutor General, who has a keen sense of which way the wind is blowing, and the current President, who, incidentally, according to Melnichenko's tapes, once swore personal allegiance to Kuchma...
I believe the People's Assembly, which will take place on Friday, November 21, on the Maidan, will demand Poroshenko's immediate resignation. Poroshenko himself will deservedly receive, if not a red card, then at least a yellow card...
Economics from the Prophet
Subscribe to our channels in Telegram, Facebook, Twitter, VC — Only new faces from the section CRYPT!