A welcome gift for developers. Member of Parliament Hryvko from the Servant of the People surprised with a bill

A draft law (11506) has appeared in the Verkhovna Rada that allows developers to get what they have been dreaming of for years: to take control of archaeological land.

Currently, according to the law, all archaeological sites are state property, and this is in line with the European Convention on the Protection of Archaeological Heritage, which has been ratified by Ukraine, and the Constitution of Ukraine (Article 54).

However, everything can change, and control over such valuable sites that store information about the statehood and history of Ukraine can be gained by local authorities, which will then be able to transfer these sites to developers.

To do this, it is enough to amend a single article of the Law on the Protection of Cultural Heritage (Article 17).

Excerpt from draft law 11506. Comparative table with proposed amendments to the law

This is the legislative initiative submitted by MP Serhiy Hryvko (Servant of the People). He is known for his earlier proposal to introduce a “childlessness tax” and to allow convicts to “pedal and generate electricity.” He considered this initiative “creative”.

Hryvko is a member of the Committee on Social Policy and Veterans’ Rights, and now he has decided to transfer his “creativity” to the archaeological heritage, and this is no accident.

He was elected to the Verkhovna Rada from one of the majority constituencies in the Chernihiv region. Coincidentally, the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court recently ruled on the Chernihiv burial mounds, which were transferred to communal ownership by local authorities and then leased to a private company for plowing. The Grand Chamber ruled that the land where the mounds and other archaeological heritage sites are located should be owned by the state only. The court’s decision could have been different if what the MP proposed had become law.

Hryvko explains why he initiated such changes:

What are Mr. Hryvko's arguments?

Serhiy Hryvko

Member of Parliament (Servant of the People)

The prosecutor's office is now returning the plots distributed by local authorities with archaeological heritage to state ownership and collecting funds from local budgets. This is a big burden, especially for frontline communities, where budgets are in the red. We are talking about a court fee, which can be as high as UAH 10,000. The Land Code of Ukraine does not in any way prohibit the presence of lands of historical and cultural designation, which includes lands with archaeological monuments in communal ownership. This was confirmed by the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court in its ruling.

He cites as examples cases involving the communities of Semenivka and Sosnytsia in Chernihiv Oblast.

The National Academy of Sciences has already received Hryvko’s legislative initiative to prepare its conclusions for parliamentarians. Researcher Viacheslav Baranov explains to the civic initiative Holka what threats such legislation poses:

What threats does the draft law pose?

Viacheslav Baranov

Archaeologist, and researcher at the National Academy of Sciences

Developers are constantly dreaming about how to build where there is archeology. Such sites are usually located near water bodies in very picturesque places. Now all archaeology is under state protection, and local authorities cannot legally provide such land for construction. If this happens, as it did in Kyiv with the Kitayiv area, the prosecutor's office then goes to court and defends the state interest. If Hryvko's bill is supported, such land may no longer be only state property, but also municipal property and, in the future, private property. This means that the prosecutor's office will lose any tools to protect the public interest. Therefore, it is not difficult to guess in whose interests this is being done. Activists who defend Kitayiv or the Vasylkiv Carpathians will simply be left to deal with this problem on their own.

Photo: Didintseve Valley, Vasylkiv.info

The Kytayiv mentioned by Baranov is the land within the capital, where archaeologists have discovered the remains of fortifications, Trypillian ceramics, dwellings from the times of Kyivan Rus with clay ovens, and so on. This land was given away for construction for another 20 years during the time of Leonid Chernovetsky. This summer, the Kyiv City Council had a chance to terminate the lease agreements for all 5 plots, but the agreements were extended for three of them, and the prosecutor’s office is still in court over two of them, arguing that there is an archaeological heritage here, which means that the local authorities could not give them away for construction. The former first deputy head of the Kyiv City State Administration, Ihor Nikonov (KAN Development), wants to build here.

Vladyslav Maksymov, director of the International Institute “Actio-Expert” and lawyer representing the Institute of Archeology in the trial, notes that such a legislative initiative contradicts Ukraine’s international legal obligations:

Are there other ways to solve the problem?

Vladyslav Maksymov

Director of the International Institute “Actio-Expert”, attorney at law

It happens that an archaeological site is registered as municipal property in violation of the law, and then it is threatened, as happened with the unique monuments of national importance - the Kitayiv Archaeological Complex and the Great Khodosiv Settlement. If such changes to the law are supported, then very soon a significant part of the archaeological heritage will simply be destroyed. And this is all done under the guise of protecting local budgets from court fees. But by saving 10 thousand from the community budget, the state will lose monuments of national and sometimes world significance. If the legislator wanted to resolve the issue of court fees, he should have simply exempted communities in this category of cases from such fees. However, such a change in the law is a source of enrichment for unscrupulous entrepreneurs and corrupt officials.

Hryvko’s legislative initiative is to be considered by the Committee on Humanitarian and Information Policy, headed by Mykyta Poturaiev (Servant of the People). The head of the committee noted that, in his opinion, this draft law has no chance of getting either to the Verkhovna Rada session hall or passing the committee.
Member of the relevant committee, MP Volodymyr Viatrovych (EU), also emphasizes the risks of the draft law:

What are the prospects?

Volodymyr Viatrovych

Member of Parliament (EU), member of the relevant committee

The current law “On the Protection of Cultural Heritage” clearly states that the land on which archaeological sites are located “is in state ownership or is withdrawn (purchased) into state ownership.” This draft law provides for the possibility of taking these lands into communal ownership, and we can easily predict how this will end in the context of land corruption and a bacchanal of developers. Moreover, the draft law also prohibits the state from buying these lands back before the self-government body violates some of its obligations to protect these archaeological sites, which are not deciphered in the draft law. That is, the state, even with taxpayers' money, will be able to return this land only when the monuments have already been destroyed. I can't imagine how such an initiative could be supported by the parliament or even our specialized humanitarian committee.

Special to “Glavkom”