“Mikheil Saakashvili’s Odesa experiment”

Two months have passed since Mikheil Saakashvili’s appointment as head of the Odesa Oblast State Administration. Of course, it is way too early for any significant results, but one can already detect the overarching trend in Odesa region’s top official’s efforts. During this time, he has definitely managed to surpass all his predecessors and colleagues from other regions in frequency of media appearances: the Georgian was seen riding minibuses, engaging in scandalous conflicts with prosecutors and the chairperson of the State Aviation Service, dismissing heads of raion administrations, replacing Illichivsk port management, demolishing concrete fences on a beach... He also promised to create an administrative services center, build roads, improve other infrastructure, reform the customs service and purge corrupt officials... Therefore, we will now present Odesites’ assessments of Saakashvili’s record in his first two months in office.

“SAAKASHVILI WORKS IN FOUR DIRECTIONS...”

Hennadii CHYZHOV, political analyst:

“Saakashvili has shown a high level of communication skills, he enjoys fantastic public relations (PR) support. PR is known to go hand-in-hand with populism. Unusually, he attempts to work in four directions at once.

“The first of them is reshaping the information field to suit him. The governor never creates newsbreaks, they are rather created for him by others, so that Saakashvili may restrict his activities to attending these events. Secondly, his personnel policy has been highly populist. His deputy Yulia Marushevska may not serve as a vice-governor by the standards of Ukrainian public service, as she had no managerial experience before appointment. It takes 5 to 10 years to train a good official of this rank.

“As for heads of raion administrations, these appointments have been PR actions as well. When looking for candidates, they failed to set a primary selection criterion, so they got plenty of CVs and had 250 people competing for every place, but serious people did not submit their papers. They needed to set the criteria including at least two to three years in the public service, five to six years of managerial experience, and good experience-tested knowledge of the profession.

“Saakashvili’s third direction has been an informal local anti-corruption reform. If a person exposed as corrupt has, nonetheless, some image capital, prestige with the public, nobody moves against them. If they neglected to engage in PR activities, the governor starts putting pressure on them. The duties of his office do not include instructing prosecutors, customs officials, and law-enforcement officers. Legally, he is only a coordinator. Still, Saakashvili came to a beach and ordered a fence to be demolished, acting well outside his powers. His wishes are only advisory in nature.

“The last direction is investment promotion. The administration does work on it, but we do not know the details, just hear announcements that there will be investors from Georgia or the US. It is just irresponsible to attract investors through the magic of Saakashvili’s name while there has been no reform of the judiciary and no new local officials. We expect the governor to get a promotion in December. The investors will remain here then with empty promises, because we have no investor protection, first of all, no legal guarantees. Investors will come when we will comply with standards, when the foreign exchange reserves of the National Bank of Ukraine will cover the nation’s six-month imports. Then, strategic investors, as opposed to speculators, will apply for projects.

“The governor now has to pay attention to infrastructure. His lobbying potential with the Cabinet of Ministers is very high. He should deal with the economy, hold open meetings of the oblast administration board in each raion. This will bring results. Another question is whether he needs it. He can restore confidence in the government because of his reputation, his local success in Georgia and his unconventional approach: he walks the city’s streets, talks to people, and responds to their complaints. Overall, this will see public trust increasing.

“Odesa is not just an experiment, but an attempt to set the tone of reforms as well. Saakashvili is a reform moderator, but because of his limited powers, we have seen more talk than real reforms so far. However, it brings a lot of political capital still, which can be converted into the success of the reforms, become an impetus for them.”

“SO FAR, THE NEW GOVERNOR’S SUCCESSES HAVE BEEN MOSTLY IN THE PR FIELD”

Denys KUZMIN, political analyst:

“So far, the new governor’s successes have been mostly in the PR field. The real powers of the governor’s office are absolutely not enough for implementing ambitious reform plans. However, the panic among the old elite of Odesa has been obvious, and a serious external action is needed to overcome the vicious circle of political and economic corruption schemes. Odesa has moved to the spotlight, internationally as well, which makes many people here more optimistic. Turning Odesa into a regional and international center will only strengthen the Ukrainian state and prove that the central government does intend to create a full-fledged Ukrainian political nation, with room for various languages, cultures, and beliefs. Odesa is ideally suited for this, and its success should put an end to likely separatist sentiments and confirm the European course of our country.

“Saakashvili’s personnel policy is very risky. Despite being spectacular, his appointments are worth little without emergency powers. There is a lot of sabotage coming from the old system, which has at its disposal the courts and ambiguous legislation. Selecting people who are definitely not connected with any business interests has had citizens’ support. However, their credibility can go down quickly if one or two, at the very least, successful investment projects, based on independent foreign proposals, are not implemented soon.”

“I HAVE GROWING SUSPICIONS THAT SAAKASHVILI IS IGNORING SERHII KIVALOV’S ACTIONS”

Vira ZAPOROZHETS, journalist:

“I would not call Saakashvili’s actions reforms at the moment. Reforms should be systemic, while here, we are dealing with a man who himself admits that he does not see his Odesa job as permanent, and his time here is limited. During this time, he must at least implement his declared projects, like repairing major highways.

“Should a scandal erupt and documentary confirmation emerge, the implicated officials are instantly fired. Meanwhile, any unbiased person who knows how the judiciary, the police, and the prosecutor’s office work in Odesa, will say that Kivalov is in the center of it all. He has a pool of his own, his trusted deputies in the regional prosecutor’s office, while one district criminal court has all administrative positions held by his school’s alumni, people who are very close to him. All Saakashvili’s efforts ignore these facts. I have growing suspicions that the governor is ignoring his actions, for these people are putting pressure on businesses, all sensitive cases come to be tried by Kyivsky District Court, which is fully controlled by Kivalov, although the court lacks jurisdiction in some of them. The governor cannot help but see it. Perhaps, he has not felt Kivalov’s influence here yet. However, while he keeps leaving that man alone, all his actions will be extremely haphazard.

“Kivalov is openly opposed by Odesa’s mayor. On a further note, what will be Kivalov’s strategic choice? It seems to me that Saakashvili is forced to rely on him politically as well, because of the confrontation between the UKROP party and the governor.

“Many factories have been mothballed in Odesa. Their restart (or not) will be an indicator, whether conditions for doing business are being improved. We need some time to see it, though. I think what we have now is not the model we expected, one implemented in Georgia. People who had it good before are still doing well. Saakashvili has been promising major changes to come in January and February.”