Weekly analysis for 02 — 08 September

Draft Law № 13150 Rejected

Event

On September 4, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine rejected and removed from the agenda Draft Law № 13150, “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine on Ensuring Legality in the Activities of Local Self-Government Bodies and Their Officials” (of April 3, 2025). A day earlier, consideration of this draft law was postponed. This legislative initiative was among the draft laws included in the list of European integration draft laws and had been designated as a priority.

CPLR’s assessment

The failed vote was largely the result of numerous manipulations surrounding legislative initiatives aimed at reforming the activities of local state administrations.

Draft Law № 13150 was a not particularly successful “duplicate” of Draft Law № 4298, which proposed the transformation of local state administrations into prefecture-type bodies. One of the key objectives of the Concept for the Reform of Local Self-Government and Territorial Organization of Power in Ukraine, approved by the Cabinet of Ministers in 2014, was to bring local administrations closer to the prefecture model. For this purpose, Draft Law № 4298 was developed back in 2020 and passed its first reading in 2021.

Further work on Draft Law № 4298, however, was marked by attempts to alter the document’s original intent. This is a “unique” case where a draft law went through five different versions before the second reading. In all but the first two, new provisions were added that contradicted European standards and strayed from the objectives of reforming local state administrations.

An important element of Draft Law № 4298 was the introduction of administrative oversight over the legality of acts adopted by local self-government bodies. This mechanism was intended as a safeguard against the decentralization of corruption alongside the transfer of powers and financial resources. The same objective was also included in the Ukraine Facility program, which obligated Ukraine to establish an effective oversight mechanism by March 2025.

Instead, the government suspended consideration of Draft Law № 4298 and introduced Draft Law № 13150, an attempt to formally demonstrate compliance with its commitments to the EU. 

The proposal to establish a legality oversight mechanism for local self-government acts was the only meaningful advantage of Draft Law № 13150. However, the draft law envisioned only a conditional form of oversight at the level of regional state administrations, which did not correspond to the declared reform objectives and failed to ensure transparency or effectiveness of governance.

At the same time, the Draft Law did not fulfill its key task — to “reformat” local state administrations from bodies of general competence into prefecture-type institutions. Instead, it expanded the powers of local state administrations by adding oversight functions to their existing sectoral responsibilities. This would have increased state pressure on local self-government.

Draft Law № 13150 also failed to include important provisions on restoring civil service status to the heads and deputy heads of local state administrations.

It should also be noted that the alternative draft laws № 13150-1 and № 13150-2 were rejected as well. However, alternative Draft Law No. 13150-2, in our view, deserved attention.

According to CPLR’s experts, the rejection and withdrawal of Draft Law № 13150 prevented a dangerous expansion of the powers of local state administrations. At the same time, the decentralization reform component concerning local state administrations remains at a standstill, as do Ukraine’s related legal commitments under European integration.

The rejection of the Draft Law sent a clear signal: to meet its commitments to the EU, Ukraine must return to substantive reforms in the area of local self-government and the territorial organization of power — reforms consistent with European standards and Ukraine’s commitments. We therefore recommend that parliament resume consideration of the comprehensive Draft Law № 4298, which is broadly supported by the expert community, while refining certain contentious provisions.

Ukrainian Institute of National Memory Granted Special Status

Event

On August 21, 2025, the Law of Ukraine “On the Fundamentals of State Policy on the National Memory of the Ukrainian People” (№ 4579-IX) introduced amendments to, among others, the Laws “On the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine” and “On Central Executive Authorities”. These amendments concern the legal status of the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory.

The Ukrainian Institute of National Memory has been designated as a new type of a central executive authority (hereinafter – CEA) and has been granted special status. The law establishes a new category of such CEAs: if the CEA is tasked with ensuring the development and implementation of state policy in the area of national memory of the Ukrainian people, such an authority is to be established as the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory. With this special status, the Institute will now be represented in the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine directly by its Head.

Previously, under the Law “On Central Executive Authorities,” the Institute was classified simply as one of the “other” CEAs, without a defined type. Its activities were directed and coordinated by the Cabinet of Ministers through the Minister of Culture and Strategic Communications.

Additionally, amendments to the Law “On the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine” expanded the Government’s responsibilities to include ensuring the implementation of national memory policy of the Ukrainian people.

CPLR’s assessment

The only uncontroversial aspect of the legislative amendments is the expansion of the Cabinet of Ministers’ tasks to cover the national memory policy of the Ukrainian people.

As for the changes to the Law of Ukraine “On Central Executive Authorities”, in our view, they contradict both the principles of building the system of CEAs and the foundations of ministerial reform set out in the Public Administration Reform Strategy of Ukraine for 2022–2025. This is due to the following:

1. Classifying the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory as a separate type of “other” CEA is inappropriate. Currently, the types of “other” CEAs include services, agencies, inspectorates, commissions, and bureaus. Each of these is distinguished by the functions assigned to them by law. The Ukrainian Institute of National Memory, however, is an institution rather than a separate type of CEA. Given its functions, this categorization could create the misleading impression that multiple such institutions may be established within the framework of this new CEA type.

2. The dual classification of the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory will create difficulties in defining the specifics of its legal status and will further disrupt the consistency of the classification of other CEAs (unfortunately, this is not the first such case).

3. Increasing the number of CEAs with special status is not advisable, as these bodies are essentially exceptions to the general framework of Ukraine’s system of executive authorities. They have unique procedures for appointing and dismissing their heads, as well as special rules governing their activities. Their number should remain minimal, and the grounds for granting such status must be compelling and well justified. Moreover, Ukrainian legislation does not provide clear criteria or grounds for establishing such bodies, which should not be exploited in practice.

In the case of the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory, granting special status appears unjustified. While the importance of national memory policy for our state is beyond doubt, it cannot serve as a sufficient reason to endow this CEA with special status.

4. State policy should be developed by ministries. National memory policy is cross-sectoral in nature and must be designed and implemented across multiple areas of state policy, including education and science, culture, regional policy, and others. The Ukrainian Institute of National Memory, in turn, should focus on research and the implementation of national memory policy.

This represents a departure from the principles of ministerial reform, which aimed to clearly delineate powers between ministries and other CEAs, stripping other CEAs of political functions that do not fall within their mandate.

Furthermore, the amendments to the Law of Ukraine “On Central Executive Authorities” created a normative conflict. Paragraph 6 of part 2 of Article 17 stipulates that if a CEA is tasked with developing and implementing state policy in the area of national memory, it is to be established as the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory, whereas ministries are responsible for developing and implementing state policy in one or more sectors, while other CEAs perform specific functions related to policy implementation (paragraph 1 of part 2 of Article 1).