Inefficiency of ARMA's work costs the state billions of hryvnias: the Parliament proposes to dismiss agency heads within three days

The National Agency of Ukraine for Detection, Search and Management of Assets (ARMA) is a special-status body that, during the war, should have been replenishing the defense budget through managing enemy assets. However, according to parliamentarians, as of June 2026, the Agency is in a state of crisis.

As previously reported by the "Judicial and Legal Newspaper", on July 30, 2025, Law 4503-IX on ARMA reform officially came into force. Over its 10 years of activity, the Asset Recovery Agency has repeatedly faced harsh criticism regarding the effectiveness of its work. The National Agency on Corruption Prevention (NACP), when creating state anti-corruption programs, emphasized the imperfection of the legislation regulating ARMA's activities and the low efficiency of the processes of transferring assets to ARMA's management.

Official state budget execution indicators for 2025 under program code 6431010 "Asset Management Measures, Budget Support" indicate a critically low level of fund utilization. Of the 98.6 million UAH allocated for asset evaluation, protection, and management, only 371 thousand hryvnias were used, meaning 99.6% of budget appropriations were unused.

Due to the actual non-implementation of the program, no contracts were concluded for warehouse storage or protection of seized property. This creates risks of physical destruction and devaluation of strategic assets transferred to state management.

A particular concern is the situation with asset sales. Since December 2025, ARMA has effectively blocked the process of selling seized property. This leads to non-compliance with court rulings on asset sales. There are also reports of delays in competitive procedures on the electronic platform "Prozorro.Sales." As a result, property remains idle and loses economic value instead of generating revenue for the budget, including financing the state's defense needs.

In response to ARMA's inaction, draft bill No. 15299 has been registered in the Verkhovna Rada, proposing new ways to bring the agency out of crisis.

Legislative Initiative

The bill proposes amendments to Articles 3 and 7 of the Law of Ukraine "On the National Agency of Ukraine for Detection, Search and Management of Assets Obtained from Corruption and Other Crimes."

The initiative proposes changing the very mechanism of temporary leadership of the National Agency for Asset Recovery and Management.

The bill provides for expanding the circle of officials who can temporarily perform the duties of the Head of ARMA. In particular, in the absence or removal of the Head and his deputies, the powers of the Agency's leader may be exercised by another ARMA official appointed by the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine.

One of the proposals is to grant the relevant committee of the Verkhovna Rada the right to decide on improper performance of duties by the person temporarily heading the Agency. If such a decision is made, the Cabinet of Ministers will be obliged within three days to terminate the powers of the respective person and appoint a new acting head.

Additionally, the document introduces a mechanism for internal replacement of leadership. In case of removal of the deputies of the Head of ARMA, the performance of the leader's duties may be assigned to another official of the Agency by the relevant departmental order.

The author of the draft explains the necessity of these steps by the critical performance indicators of ARMA for 2025–2026. The asset register is not consolidated — for more than 42,000 objects there is no accurate information about their condition and legal status, and asset sales through "Prozorro.Sales" have been effectively halted since December 2025, making it impossible to execute court rulings on property sales.

Despite the need to get ARMA's work moving, questions arise about the proposed mechanism of parliamentary committee influence on personnel decisions in ARMA. Granting the committee the right to make decisions that effectively oblige the Cabinet of Ministers to terminate the powers of the temporary head of the Agency may be seen as potential legislative interference in the executive branch's powers.

Moreover, the bill does not contain clearly defined criteria for establishing the fact of "improper performance of duties" by the person temporarily heading ARMA. The absence of specific evaluation indicators may create risks of subjective interpretation and use of the mechanism as a tool for political influence.

However, the main challenge after possible adoption of the law will be maintaining a balance between strengthening control over ARMA's activities and preventing the use of new mechanisms as tools for political or corporate influence on the management of seized assets. The effectiveness of the proposed changes will be determined not by the number of new powers or control mechanisms, but by their practical results. Primarily, this concerns the restoration of full competitive procedures for selecting managers and asset sales, execution of court decisions, and ensuring stable revenues to the state budget.

Subscribe to our Telegram channel t.me/sudua and to Google News SUD.UA, as well as to our VIBER and WhatsApp, Facebook page and Instagram to stay updated on the most important events.