Daniel Bilak is Senior Counsel at Kinstellar, one of Central and Eastern Europe’s leading international law firms. A Canadian-qualified lawyer with 30 years of professional experience in the CEE region, Daniel is an experienced private sector and institutional reform practitioner. 

He currently advises clients in the energy, agribusiness, infrastructure and technology sectors in the region. Recently, he served three years as Chief Investment Adviser to the Prime Minister of Ukraine and established and directed UkraineInvest, the Ukrainian government’s foreign direct investment promotion agency; during his tenure, UkraineInvest unlocked US $3 billion of investment from existing and new investors. As Deputy Chairman of Ukrainian Railways and Supervisory Board member of the State Savings Bank of Ukraine, Daniel gained extensive experience regarding the reform of corporate governance of state-owned enterprises.

Daniel’s public sector experience extends to rule of law, judicial reform, administrative reform, and anti-corruption matters. Daniel twice served as principal adviser and chief of staff to the Minister of Justice of Ukraine. He was also senior integrity and democratic governance adviser to successive presidents and prime ministers of Ukraine.

In these capacities, Daniel obtained intimate knowledge of the machinery of government in transition democracies and the practical application of reforms. He helped develop new transparency procedures, establish internal and external oversight mechanisms to enhance public accountability and improve service delivery, and institutionalise citizen participation and feedback in government decision-making. He was engaged in the restructuring of the ministries of justice, health, education, agriculture, social policy, environment, and economy in Ukraine.

Together with Professor Denis Galligan of Oxford University, Daniel assisted the governments of Bulgaria and Lithuania with administrative justice reform as part of their European Union accession programmes. The projects resulted in the drafting and passage of a new Administrative Procedure Code for Bulgaria and improvements to the functioning of Lithuania’s system of administrative tribunals and administrative court system.