E-government expert (she has worked as programmer since she was 16) and advisor to the mayor of Dnipro (previously also advisor to Minister of Economic Development and Trade of Ukraine Aivaras Abromavicius and the mayor of Lviv), Jaanika Merilo believes that the malfunction plaguing the e-declaration program appeared in the very first phase when it was being developed. “One can always create both a decent, workable solution and one which is clearly unable to work at a certain load, on small servers, etc. That is, the experts had to anticipate problems that might arise,” Merilo told The Day in an interview. “And then everything went wrong. Apparently, no one saw the specification to which it was being developed. If the specification calls for creating a very large system, they will do it. If the intended load is up to 1,000 documents, they will do it differently. That is, the specification is key here.”
“And then there was so much of every kind of bluff around it, as they were saying that reclamations had been made, something had been corrected, reworked... That is, the question involves not so much technical aspects, but rather public communication, as people do not believe the agency anymore. Worst of all, they all bluffed: the National Agency on Corruption Prevention (NACP), the State Enterprise Ukrainian Special Systems (USS), which the program was transferred to, and Miranda Inc. I think that such public lying deserves to be punished by itself, even if there were no harmful consequences. People should be responsible for what they say, especially if what they say is not really truth,” Merilo believes.
The expert said that it was difficult to predict whether the e-declaration system could be quickly reworked without information about its architecture. “I am not quite sure that they can modify it if the architecture was wrong from the outset. We have had, for example, this issue plaguing the registers of the Ministry of Justice, and they cannot bear the load today, that is, they are not responding every now and then. One can move them to other servers, but it will not change anything at this point. Therefore, I believe that there is more than they say to the e-declaration program debacle, because they would have already reworked it otherwise. That is, the problem is precisely with the specification or architecture. Still, it is a small system in fact. I think Privat 24 bears loads which are higher by an order of magnitude or two than the system of e-declaration. It is quite easy to create a working system.”
What is the political way out? Merilo believes that “the political solution of the situation can look thus: the NACP must announce that they have not coped with the task, thank the nation for its trust, and resign to make way for those who can cope better and rework the system, if possible. When this system was transferred to the USS, their geeks initially said they would immediately get everything going, the system would work and so on. Well, Miranda transferred it all to them, and the situation has not improved... That is, the correct political decision is to finally act as honorable people and say: ‘We have failed. Let our betters come and do it.’ Instead, the circus continues, and it is a shame.”
If you want to learn whether Merilo stands by her forecast that Ukraine’s transition to e-government will take 15 years, and how she manages to implement a number of electronic projects in Dnipro, read the next issue of The Day.
