RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service runs the Schemes program which features hard-hitting, detailed and thoroughly reported investigative journalism. The program’s objectives and the stories it features reflect Ukraine’s battle against corruption and the protection of journalists. Working under constant pressure and sometimes in hostile environments, Schemes’ reporters seek to hold government officials accountable and strengthen democratic institutions in Ukraine.

In October 2016 Schemes was the first to report that members of Ukraine’s new National Anti-Corruption Agency had received large bonuses in addition to their already high salaries. When agency chief Natalia Korchak was questioned in parliament about the bonuses in April 2017, a social media video of her previous denial to the prime-minister of having received such a bonus earned 1.2 million views on the Ukrainian Service’s Facebook page.

Another Schemes investigation took viewers to the gates of the country’s security service, the SBU. Schemes Reporter Valeriya Yegoshyna showed how SBU officers used the state agency’s luxury cars to conduct their own private side businesses.

Schemes reporters investigated a curious gathering of government security cars, ambulances and fire trucks near a Kyiv suburb restaurant complex. They learned that the equipment had been assembled in preparation for the wedding of the son of Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko — an event where Ukraine’s most powerful and influential political and business elites attended. Government bodyguards eventually assaulted the RFE/RL reporters as they were documenting the arrival of officials at the wedding. Schemes’ footage of the attack was viewed more than a million times on YouTube and 650,000 times on Facebook.

A Schemes investigative report showing how Ukrainian officials, former officials and oligarchs  ignore traffic rules has been viewed more than 200,000 times on YouTube, and a social video showing dangerous driving by a group of vehicles transporting billionaire businessman Rinat Akhmetov received some 300,000 views on Facebook. A spokesperson for Prosecutor General Lutsenko, one of the subjects of the program, tried to excuse the documented traffic violations by claiming that they did not cause any danger on the road.