The decentralization reform is a real success for our country! Today we celebrate the 10th anniversary of the start of local government reform. The full-scale war has only proved the effectiveness of decentralization, but at the same time posed fundamentally new challenges to the reform. So, what has decentralization been remembered for over these 10 years? Does the Roadmap of the reform meet its current challenges? Yurii Mykytiuk, Head of Regional Programs at the RPR Coalition, spoke about all this on the air of the Suspilne studio. 

Below are the key points:

• We don’t have many success stories in reforms that would unite representatives of the central government, parliament, and the Cabinet of Ministers. They would also be this “institutional memory” that was started by the previous government and continued by the current one. This is a very good story that unites and has united.
• The decentralization reform was subjected to a kind of “crash test” by the full-scale Russian invasion. We have seen (including research data) that the decentralization reform was one of the elements of our country’s resilience. Precisely because citizens clearly understood their belonging to a particular community, they also understood their connection to that community. In this context, for example, we can talk about the phenomenon of volunteering, which has intensified in Ukraine. It is also related to the fact that representatives of local governments, in particular, took a big part in it.
• First of all, decentralization is about the transfer of powers and resources. Will the central government, parliament, and ministers be able to create all the conditions for the development of local powers? The success of the reform at the first stage depends on this. At the second stage (and this is the second point), will the local self-government be able to take advantage of these conditions? We see different situations in communities, so it is important to talk about the ability to realize the chances provided. 
• Third, the role of citizens in the reform process. Without citizen participation in solving local problems, without citizen control, the reform will not be fully successful. 
• The reform must continue. And the Roadmap for this, recently presented by the Ministry, is quite positive. At the same time, my key message: The Great War has made its adjustments to the understanding of what the decentralization reform is, what priorities we have to set today, what problems to solve… And this requires new solutions. And to find these new solutions, a dialog between the government and civil society is needed.