14 December 2015, 12:43
In his
speech at the meeting on December 11, 2015 held at the Ministry of Regional
Development, Construction and Housing and Communal Services of Ukraine, the
Committee Chairperson said that the Ministry, "despite different opinions
on certain issues, is the partner of the Committee and thanks to this
cooperation the year of 2015 has become an important stage towards power
decentralization and local self-government reform. Council of Europe experts
provided Ukraine with considerable assistance in the elaboration of new
legislation. Adopted were a number of major laws that gave birth to the
reforming."
"People are tired of waiting for changes, they want local authorities to
cooperate with them," the head of the Parliamentary Committee said.
"Now we are waiting for the voting in the Verkhovna Rada for draft
amendments to the Constitution of Ukraine as regards decentralization and local
self-government, we need 300 votes," he went on. "The situation in
the Parliament is complicated - it is mainly due to the introduction into the "body"
of the Constitution of Ukraine of an article on the peculiarities of local
self-government in Donbas".
"Unfortunately,
Ukrainian citizens are still little aware of the purpose of local
self-government reform, do not understand what benefits they will receive from
the power decentralization, what will improve in the communities after their
unification." Chairperson of the Committee advised the European partners
through the Programme "Decentralisation and Territorial Consolidation in
Ukraine” help officials to strengthen PR-campaign on the content and targets of
the reform, and maybe even start a separate project for this purpose.
Alfonso Zardi, the Head of the Democratic Institutions and Governance
Department, Directorate General of Democracy (DG II), the Council of Europe,
said at the meeting: "Even if the amendments to the Constitution are not
adopted in the near future, the Council of Europe will abide by its promises
and will continue assisting Ukrainian reformers to renovate the country."
Reference information:
The Council of Europe's Programme "Decentralisation and Territorial Consolidation in Ukraine” is a part of the third Council of Europe Action Plan for Ukraine for 2015-2017, approved in 2015 to help the country in fulfillment of its statutory obligations of acting in line with the Council of Europe standards. It contains two components - "Regional offices of reforms to support decentralization" and "Territorial Reform (unification and cooperation)."