273 MPs supported the draft law No. 12089, which numerous public and environmental organizations and activists demanded not to vote for because of the risks of carving up forests and coastal strips for construction.
MP Yaroslav Zheleznyak announced the results of the vote on Telegram. The updated status of this document can also be seen in his card.
The full title of the draft law is as follows: “On Amendments to the Civil Code of Ukraine on Strengthening the Protection of the Rights of a Good Faith Purchaser”.
Both before the first and second readings, civil society organizations, including the Ukrainian Nature Protection Group (UNPG), Ecodia, WWF-Ukraine, Greenpeace-Ukraine, Ecology. Law. People, Green Force, and others, called on MPs not to support the document and on citizens to send appeals to their elected representatives demanding that they not vote for it. More than 20 CSOs signed a joint statement to this effect.
Environmental scientists, lawyers, and investigative journalists also warned of the risks posed by the document.
“If it is adopted, it will not only neglect nature conservation. It will multiply by zero all the time that employees of forestry enterprises, the State Enterprise “Forests of Ukraine”, the State Forestry Agency, the State Environmental Inspectorate, the State Water Agency, the Ministry of Environment, and the prosecutor's office have spent over the years preparing documents for courts, conducting examinations, going to courts, and corresponding with each other. They have been working to return illegally stolen forests, rivers and protected areas to the state,” warned Petro Testov, an ecologist at the UPG.
According to him, the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources, the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine have sent letters opposing this draft law.
What is the draft law No. 12089 about?
- The state or communities have 10 years to regain land or real estate illegally withdrawn from their ownership and acquired by a “bona fide purchaser.” If this period has expired, there will be no such opportunity.
- If less than 10 years have passed since the transaction and the court finds that the real estate or land was illegally withdrawn, then the state or community must fully compensate the “bona fide purchaser” for the value of the land or real estate. At the same time, no compensation for losses to the state and territorial community is provided.
- The draft law allegedly makes exceptions for land of strategic importance, critical infrastructure, the nature conservation fund, and cultural heritage. But experts say that there are many legal subtleties that will make the return of such land or real estate to state ownership impossible.
Why the public is against it
The Anti-Corruption Action Center (AntAC) says that draft law No. 12089 was actively supported by business, but it could lead to the actual legalization of land schemes. The main risk, according to experts, is that the draft law allows legalizing any land illegally withdrawn from the ownership of the state or territorial community if 10 years have passed since such withdrawal.
In the final version of the draft law, MPs and the relevant committee did not take into account several important nuances, the AntAC says. The experts provided the following list:
- Land that could not be legally alienated (for example, a beach on the seashore or a plot of forest) was often illegally alienated. A “bona fide purchaser” who buys such an asset is well aware that such land cannot be purchased legally.
- “Good faith purchasers” are often part of a corrupt scheme. Numerous investigations have shown that land alienation schemes are initially structured so that the land passes through several levels of owners before ending up in the hands of the final beneficiary, who is “in the know and in the game” from the very beginning. The latter is formally a “bona fide purchaser”.
- The draft law does not take into account the fact that the boundaries of the lands of the nature protection fund or cultural heritage are often not clearly defined and not recorded in the State Land Cadastre. In such cases, the state completely loses the mechanisms for returning these assets in its favor.
- The wording proposed in the draft law may complicate the return of property and land in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine. This problem was directly pointed out to the MPs by the Main Legal Department of the Verkhovna Rada.
Environmentalist Petro Testov said that none of the businesses that seem to support draft law No. 12089 has responded to either official or public appeals from the UPG.
Who supported this draft law
The Draft Law “On Amendments to the Civil Code of Ukraine on Strengthening the Protection of the Rights of a Good Faith Purchaser” was actively supported by business representatives. Thus, the Federation of Employers of Ukraine (FEU) spoke in favor of its adoption. It noted that this draft law sets a period of 10 years, which is significantly longer than the standard limitation period of 3 years for challenging the unlawful acquisition of property rights. The FEU believes that this draft law will create a more predictable environment for business development and for investors, which is a prerequisite for attracting investment to Ukraine.
The employers also emphasized that for the first time, real responsibility for local governments and state authorities for the provision of land plots is introduced with the obligation to compensate the market value of property in case of illegal alienation.
Members of the Union of Ukrainian Entrepreneurs (SUP) also supported the adoption of draft law No. 12089. They consider it “critically important for protecting the rights of bona fide purchasers, including businesses, from abuse of the law enforcement system, which often questions land acquisition transactions.” The CJU is confident that without guarantees of stable property rights, no national or international business will invest in Ukraine.
As a reminder, on November 20, 2024, the Parliament voted in the first reading for the draft law No. 12089 on strengthening the protection of the rights of a bona fide purchaser, which was previously criticized by representatives of environmental NGOs.
