Publish the article by Yagenka Vilchak "Visas for Currency".
In Ukraine, visas to Poland are free, but who would believe such things Visas to Poland are a desirable commodity in Ukraine. People go to Poland for trade and for work. A visa earns back its cost. So no one particularly complains that although it is officially free, one has to pay for it. But they accuse Poles of corruption. JAGIENKA WILCZAK The Polish consulate in Lutsk is located on one of the city's main avenues, near the Catholic cathedral and the bishop's curia. Thanks to the Polish consulate, this is now the most expensive district in Lutsk: business is done here, prices for plots and premises have gone up, facades have been renovated.
The most popular figure is Consul General Wojciech Gałązka: – He is more important to us than the bishop – say the residents. Even children and taxi drivers know the names of the others. The city has advanced thanks to the opening of the Polish diplomatic mission.
In front of the building, a crowd of applicants swarms every day, all standing in line for visas. Word quickly spread across the Wild Fields that in Volhynia it is easier and cheaper to obtain a pass to paradise than at other consulates. This year, over 89,000 visas have been issued here, a thousand a day. Sometimes queues form as early as the evening. A good position can still be taken before dawn, at three or four in the morning. – After that, it's not worth the effort – say those in the know.
100 visas per hour Visas for Ukrainians are free. Poland introduced them on October 1, 2003, in connection with our accession to the European Union (similarly for Belarusians and Russians). We travel to Ukraine without visas. A single or multiple-entry visa to Poland can be obtained by anyone who presents a valid passport at the consulate and a visa questionnaire filled out in the Latin alphabet. According to the interpretation of the law on foreigners in force until now, persons holding six-month multiple-entry visas could stay in Poland for 90 days. A new visa was issued after the previous one expired. Persons studying, doing business, or officially working in Poland receive annual visas. Lutsk is the largest oblast city in Volhynia. When Poland, in connection with joining the Union, was forced to introduce visas for Ukrainians less than a year ago, by virtue of a joint Polish-Ukrainian agreement it was decided that one of the two new consulates would be established right here (alongside Odesa). The diplomatic mission in Lutsk was to relieve and soften the expected onslaught on the consulate in Lviv, which even before the introduction of visas had more work than it could handle. Especially since many Poles live in the Lutsk consular district (which covers three local voivodeships: Lutsk, Rivne, and Zhytomyr). There are also two border crossings nearby, in Zosin and Dorohusk, and Volhynians have traditionally traveled for shopping to Hrubieszów, Zamość, and Lublin.
Initially, no one could imagine a consulate in Lutsk; Ukrainians in particular were unhappy with the idea and even wrote protests to the authorities, saying they preferred to go to Kyiv, because that is where people had always gone to handle important matters.
When the consulate opened on October 1 last year, residents gave it a wide berth and traveled to the capital for visas. However, they quickly changed their minds: the consulate was located in the city center, several local people were hired there, and visas could be obtained almost on the spot. The consulate quickly enlivened the sleepy, provincial city and introduced a new spirit into its life. Soon it turned out that visas offer a chance for a decent business.
We have five consulates in Ukraine The Consulate General in Kyiv employs 9 consuls and vice-consuls and 30 staff members; it issues 600 visas a day; since the beginning of the year until the first days of June – 64,000. The Consulate in Lviv – 7 visa consuls and 23 officials; 1,400 visas a day; this year 93,500 visas. The Consulate in Lutsk – 5 visa consuls and 17 staff members; a thousand visas a day. In Odesa and Kharkiv the traffic is smaller – 40–50 visas a day (6,000 and 7,000 respectively by the beginning of June). At all consulates, visas are issued on the spot on the day the applications are submitted. At first, visa questionnaires were photocopied for a few dozen kopecks at nearby copy shops, then the first specialists in filling out forms appeared outside the consulate: data had to be entered in the Latin alphabet, and for many people this was an insurmountable difficulty. Filling out the documents initially cost 25 hryvnias, the equivalent of $5. Services were provided on the sidewalk, in a nearby parking lot, in surrounding gateways and bars. And at night – under a streetlamp. But the business was only just getting going: with queues for visas growing stronger week by week, an institution of the "stachka" (stander) arose spontaneously outside the consulate. A stander could be hired for the night to hold a place in the queue. One could also buy from him a convenient place on the queue's informal list.
Finally, the consulate began to be surrounded by offices that – for a higher fee – offered to arrange a visa to Poland without the need to stand in line. Citizens from other oblasts began coming to Lutsk, because there were no territorial restrictions in visa matters.
To Poland via Texas
On the other side of the street, almost directly opposite the consulate, is the Texas bar. The interior is diversified with elements of the Wild West transferred straight to the Wild Fields: there are cowboy hats, Colts, a sheriff's star attached to a wooden beam. Practically the bar is open around the clock, twenty-four hours a day. Texas lives off the consulate.
From early morning, at a table to the right of the entrance, an improvised visa office begins operating. Two Ukrainian women preside here, a bleached blonde and a brunette, joined every now and then by young men dressed in leather jackets, with hair styled with gel. The men bring passports, photos, and visa questionnaires to be filled out. A pile of documents grows on the table.
No one hides anything. Besides, in the bar everyone is one of their own, an insider. The guests at the tables are applicants from outside the consulate. They eat, drink, pay for the toilet. – Those in leather are recruiters – informs a Ukrainian woman sitting at the next table, waiting for her visa troubles to be resolved. – They collect passports from people standing in line outside the consulate. Arranging a visa costs $50.
Indeed, one only needs to linger near the consulate to receive an offer. – Some trouble? Need help? – asks a man in a navy jacket.
People pay because they cannot cope with the transliteration of their own first and last names. They are convinced that outside the consulate someone will do it better for them. All help must cost money, and no one believes that today anything can be arranged for free. It would be a shock to arrange something without a bribe. No one believes that visas to Poland are free. Everyone pays and does not argue. Such is the Ukrainian's experience.
Difficult matters must cost more. A difficult matter is the cancellation of a visa. If someone had a six-month visa entitling them to stay in Poland for 90 days and has already used up the entire quota, they do not have to wait another three months in Ukraine in order to leave again in accordance with the law. Arranging departure immediately costs $150. – No problem – informs a recruiter who works for the people from Texas. One must entrust him with a passport and a questionnaire with photographs. The game is fair: the money is collected after the matter is resolved, of course positively.
– For money, anything can be arranged at the consulate – claims my informant. In his opinion, all recruiters must pay off one of the consuls. – For several weeks I earned extra money filling out questionnaires in Latin script. Then two men in leather came up to me. They told me to get lost if I didn't want to pick my teeth up off the sidewalk. They don't want competition, because they work for one of the consuls. I thought my health was more important and gave it up – he admits. In his opinion, the same consul also took money for a place on the queue list to the window. The best harvest was in winter, when frozen crowds swarmed outside the consulate. – Without work in Poland we would have died already – people say in the queue. They ask for tourist visas.
In the local weekly "Simia i dim" (Family and Home), an article appeared entitled "To Poland via Texas," in which the author described the alternative consulate operating in the city's famous bar. In his opinion, one could arrange a visa there without standing in line, but for a fee. Places in the queue were also sold. The fee ranged from 5 to 15 hryvnias.
Recently, as one informant says, a raid on the recruiters in front of the consulate building was carried out by units of the Ukrainian special services Alfa. Several people were detained who claimed in chorus that they work for travel agencies accredited by the consulate. The heads of these agencies, brought in for questioning, were supposed to confirm that they pay tribute to one of the consuls. Passports do not go for visa processing through the official route via the window, but are brought in through the back door. By the same route, passports are delivered in which a visa must be cancelled and a new one issued entitling entry to Poland immediately. It is precisely for this service that $150 was demanded at Texas.
The militia raid frightened no one. On the contrary, the Ukrainian militia, OVIR, itself also took on the role of intermediary. The militia brings new passports for visa processing before they even reach their owners' hands. This is called comprehensive service. No one at the consulate would dare refuse.
Another version is also circulating in the city: that the spreading of rumors about the consulate in Lutsk is financed by the visa mafia from Lviv, which fears losing clients. Lutsk serves quickly and well – so half of the Lviv oblast comes here.
To the dump
On the same street, also near the consulate, there is another eatery called the "banya." In the "banya" several service points operate. There are visa agencies here, form-filling, photocopying, a photographer, and offices where health insurance for travel to Poland is sold, medical strakhuvannia. In Lutsk it is said that without a strakhuvka for 180 hryvnias, purchased necessarily and obligatorily near the consulate, there was no point in setting out for a visa. According to some – the offices shared their earnings with Polish officials. According to others – insurance is a sector controlled by the family of President Kuchma. Meanwhile, the regulations say nothing about the necessity of presenting insurance at the consulate. It only needs to be purchased before crossing the border.
Recently information appeared that the consulate would accept only applications filled out by typewriter. The owners of intermediary offices are already rubbing their hands: they expect this to drive clients to them, because almost no one has a computer or a typewriter with a Latin font at home. The business will pick up again, and that's the point.
Several travel agencies are also located in the building opposite the consulate. The stairwell smells of sauerkraut, flakes of peeling paint hang from the walls, the stairs are full of mud and cigarette butts. At the office they say that with them one can travel, but only to Poland. They will gladly and for a fee arrange a visa and insurance. At the office one floor down they also recommend visas to Poland.
A visa can even be arranged at a beauty salon: a large advertisement informs that it takes 2, at most 4 days.
We fight with all our strength
Consul General in Lutsk Wojciech Gałązka says that about 70 offices from Volhynia applied for accreditation in visa intermediation. Now there are 25 intermediaries; the consulate sent information about their activities to tax offices and the anti-corruption bureau so that everything would be done lege artis. At the information market it is said that accreditation cost a thousand dollars and that the offices pay a commission on each visa – $10. The office owners deny it: they paid nothing at the consulate.
Maciej Szymański, deputy head of the consular department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, says that there are not too many bad practices. There are more rumors, although recently two people suspected of corruption were dismissed at one of the consulates. It is true that recruiters outside consulates offer their services. But there are no queues; consulates beyond the eastern border issue visas on the spot on the day the papers are submitted. – What would people pay for? – he asks. – Perhaps Ukrainians are earning off Ukrainians, someone is scooping up the money, even though visas are free. However, several strict rules have been introduced. Consulates are no longer allowed to conclude intermediation agreements with travel companies: every company must stand in line to register passports.
In Lutsk there is rotation every day; no one knows in advance what position they will work at. This makes it impossible to visa passports that come out of turn. – We change the rules, we rotate people between consulates in order to break all the connections that may arise and become overgrown with corruption – assures Director Szymański. To keep an eye on what happens outside the consulate, local authorities were mobilized. – We cannot cope with this on our own – he admits.
In the afternoon at the Texas bar it is time for visa collection. Passports and dollars pass from hand to hand.