The Stefanishyna case: How Zelenskyy's team undermines independent competitions and why international experts are still indispensable

On August 5, during a hearing on determining a preventive measure for former Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Justice Olha Stefanishyna, prosecutors from the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office (SAPO) disclosed a series of messages. It is a must-read for anyone who believes that the Zelenskyy government is willing to conduct objective, independent, and transparent competitions for key positions in law enforcement and anti-corruption bodies.

These messages document a method of interfering in procedures that should be protected from political influence.

The correspondence disclosed in court paints a clear picture.

Back in 2022, during the competition for the NABU Director position, Stefanishyna sent the head of the selection commission a direct instruction: she needed specific candidates and identified them by their exact ranking positions. She also stated that the commission's meetings should be postponed until those candidates "became eligible."

Thus, in the correspondence, Commission Chair Kucheriavenko sends Stefanishyna a screenshot with a list of candidates. Stefanishyna replies (translated):

"Only one [candidate on the list] is out. The rest have passed. Do whatever you want. I need 60 [ed. – Liudmyla Suhak] and 62 [ed. – Pavlo Kyrylenko]. Postpone the meeting. It's not my job to do the thinking for you."

Fortunately, Stefanishyna's favourites at the time, Pavlo Kyrylenko and Liudmyla Suhak, failed to score enough points even with such interference.

Other materials presented by the SAPO prosecutor revealed that Stefanishyna also influenced the 2024 competition for the NACP Head position. This time, the scheme was more sophisticated. Through the head of her office, Stefanishyna coordinated the positions of commission members controlled by the government, agreed in advance on a list of priority candidates, and even gave instructions on which candidates should receive lower scores.

As a result, Stefanishyna managed to get her preferred candidates into the final round. Moreover, Serhii Hupiak, then an SBI official who had been identified in the correspondence from the outset as one of the key favoured candidates, became deputy head of the NACP.

Judging by the subsequent correspondence, the current NACP head, Viktor Pavlushchyk, was also on Stefanishyna's shortlist. It is worth acknowledging that we at the Anti-corruption Action Center also made a mistake at the time welcoming the outcome of this competition.

We can now clearly see the consequences. While the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) serves notices of suspicion on some of the country's highest-ranking officials, including Yermak, Chernyshov, Halushchenko, and Stefanishyna herself, the NACP has produced no visible results.

The NACP kept its review of Yermak's asset declaration under wraps until he was served with a notice of suspicion, yet found no issues with it. The NACP did not even begin verifying former Minister Halushchenko's declaration until March this year, by which time he was already facing corruption charges from NABU.

The NACP's poor performance has also been noted by the EU. In its latest Enlargement Report, published in November 2025, the European Commission cited "concerns regarding its [NACP's] impartiality and effectiveness in some of its operations."

It is clear that Stefanishyna was unlikely to have acted on her own initiative, rather under a mandate from the Office of the President as its "overseer" for such competitions. The existence of such detailed correspondence, containing specific names, scores, and instructions on "who should not be given 30 points," suggests that this was not a one-off attempt, but part of an established practice by the Bankova to "hack" competitions involving experts nominated by international partners.

Another important point is the reason behind all of this. If Stefanishyna's favoured candidate, Kyrylenko, had become NABU head, the Bureau would hardly have been able to investigate the very illicit enrichment case in which Stefanishyna herself has now been served with a notice of suspicion. We would also probably never have heard of the "Midas" operation or other high-level corruption cases. In fact, Kyrylenko himself later received several notices of suspicion from NABU and SAPO.

This brings us to the main point. Now, Ukraine's highest priority in the rule-of-law area is to meet the requirements of the first negotiation cluster in the EU accession process. One of the key requirements is to ensure the participation of international experts in selecting candidates for the most senior positions in the judiciary and law enforcement.

These tasks include reforming the procedure for appointing the Prosecutor General and rebooting the State Bureau of Investigation. Without these reforms, progress in this area will be impossible.

The law currently provides no competitive selection procedure for appointing the Prosecutor General. The current model for the SBI selection commission is based on parity: three members are appointed by the Verkhovna Rada, three by the President, and three on the nomination of international partners. The commission adopts decisions by a simple majority.

In practice, this means that the votes of international experts can simply be neutralised by the consolidated position of government appointees. That is exactly what happened in 2021, when Oleksii Sukhachov, a candidate affiliated with the Office of the President, won the competition. The results of Sukhachov's leadership at the State Bureau of Investigation, and his unquestioning compliance with instructions from Bankova, are well known.

That is precisely why the forthcoming legislative changes must not merely introduce competitions as a formality, but also give international experts a decisive say. Otherwise, Ukraine will fail to meet key requirements for further progress towards EU membership.

The experience of recent years shows that when international experts have had a decisive vote, the results have been significantly better. However, even this is not an ideal model and, as the NACP experience shows, it does not guarantee that a selection process will be free from political interference. But so far, no better procedure has been devised in Ukraine.

The Public Council of International Experts, established to evaluate candidates for certain judicial positions, allowed virtually no candidates with integrity concerns to serve on the High Anti-Corruption Court, which has since handed down around 400 verdicts in high-level corruption cases.

The High Qualification Commission of Judges and the High Council of Justice, with international experts holding the decisive vote, dismissed dozens of judges who failed to meet integrity standards. The competition for the NABU Director position, despite all attempts by Stefanishyna and others involved to undermine it, was conducted transparently precisely because of the role of international experts.

By contrast, when international experts either lacked a decisive vote or their position was simply ignored, reform stalled or failed altogether.

The international members of the commission, in fact, saved the competition for the Director of the Economic Security Bureau from outright dubious candidates.

Now, however, the High Qualification Commission of Judges (HQCJ) Selection Commission is left without international experts, as their tenure expired. Parliament is blocking the legislative changes needed to reinstate them. The relevant draft law was registered last year, but so far very few members of the Verkhovna Rada are interested in its adoption.

Therefore, the main conclusion to be drawn from the Stefanishyna case does not depend on the outcome of the criminal investigation against her. The case materials already serve as a verdict on the current system of power, which repeatedly seeks to circumvent independent procedures whenever they threaten its control over key institutions.

That is why, in the selection processes for Prosecutor General and head of the State Bureau of Investigation, the two most politically sensitive positions in Ukraine's law enforcement and justice systems, the decisive vote of international experts cannot be viewed as a mere formality or a concession to European donors. It is the only safeguard that actually works against politically controlled appointments.

It is clear that the involvement of experts nominated by international partners is a temporary measure, and sooner or later Ukrainian institutions must demonstrate their ability to conduct selection processes independently.

But today, when the Bankova is trying to influence the outcome even with international experts involved, abandoning their decisive role would be a major step backwards, precisely when the stakes for EU accession and public demand for the rule of law to be genuinely upheld are higher than ever.