Mr. Ulan Melisbek, Head of Kyrgyzpatent – reformer, as he calls himself, or tyrant, as claim his opponents?

There is an unambiguous answer for this question, if we will not search for the truth and take side of the conflicting parties, what usually is the wish of the parties. They strive to get the public appreciation and persuade that they are right but not the others. The formula of the Eastern sages who asserted, contrary to common opinion that the dispute give birth not to truth but only spoils relations, can be applied to the confrontation between Mr. Ulan Melisbek, new chairman of Kyrgyzpatent and group of patent attorneys, who recently were excluded from the Registry.

Troublemaker

No day without a scandal! It can be assumed that this is a new motto of the office which in charge of intellectual property issues in the country. As soon as Mr. Ulan Melisbek was appointed as chairman, the storm came to the quiet harbor, where three dozens of patent attorneys found a haven. And the storm has been raging for eight months now since Mr. Ulan Melisbek by the invitation of the government arrived to Kyrgyzstan from USA in order to implement reforms in certain public office.

It needs to be said that in the beginning many were surprised by the decision of the seventh floor of the While House. Why Melisbek? Until then he was known to kyrgyzstanese as the web-site owner and one of its authors, who was unmasking reign of Akaev from the far West and later mistakes of the March Revolution winners.

Few knew that Mr. Ulan Melisbek, who was considered by many as a journalist, had a managerial qualification, besides in IT field and also he used to be a patent attorney. More one knows about, more understands that the choice was not accidental. At least it is not late payment for his publications in the Internet.

He arrived with a dream to introduce reforms to Kyrgyzstan, which was tired of revolution slogans, demonstrations and disorder of crowds. Moreover he arrived to such apolitical office as Kyrgyzpatent, where staff worked quietly, without drawing attention of officials. But young, energetic and ambitious chairman, who from very first days decisively started to change the routine order and life rhythm of patent attorneys, who by that time safely went through several governments and several directors, brought a clear discord into routine life.

Story of patent attorneys

There are about 30 of them in the republic and that is all for years of independence of the country. At the moment only about ten of them actually work but just seven are productive and active. Therefore it will be correct to say that the qualified patent attorney is unique good.

I involuntary witness to the formation of patent specialists. It was in nineties. Great Soviet power just collapsed. There was devastation, confusion and fear of unknown in the whole country and in individual minds. We all clumsily tried to adapt to rough environment, and to find ourselves in actively invading market economy.

Honestly speaking I was surprised to hear talks of people with technical qualifications, who lost their jobs. They talked about the opportunity to earn money by registering trade marks and inventions. And not somewhere in Moscow but we didn’t have our own patent office. At the moment when there was a huge mess in socialistic camp, economic and political network was ruined, factories were closing down and, as I thought, nobody cared about inventions or copyright.

It was difficult to understand how one can get income from thing which did not exist and was not demanded. Because intellectual property did not have any value in transition period. But I was wrong. And the guys were so right and predicted the future Their time came; they waited till the time, when the process of registering the fruits of inquisitive human mind started again in our country. And then those, whom I called “Bishkek dreamers” in my mind, were first in the list of patent attorneys in sovereign republic.

According to the former patent attorney number one, Mrs. Valentina Fedorova, whose work experience is more than 40 years, to pass the exam of the certifying commission was simply formality, because there were only few interested persons.

Fight for influence

Mr. Ulan Melisbek was not the only one, who tried to show to patent attorney who is the boss in the little system. Before him other heads also tried to this. But even Mr. Roman Omorov, who had the longest stay at the position of the director, was not able to limit the freedom of patent attorneys, to make them completely dependant and under control of the state organization.

These persons are voluntary middlemen between foreign applicants, such as world-known companies “Intel”, “Coca-Cola”, “Mars”, “Shell” etc and the state represented by Kyrgyzpatent, registering trademarks, copyright and objects of industrial property. The legislative base of Kyrgyzstan provides them with the right of freedom of activity. The only requirement from patent attorneys is that they should submit applications in timely manner and should deliver trademark registration fees to pay desk in full. The rest is freedom: how much they earn, where they transfer money, how much taxes they pay, it is their own business. It is natural that the officials didn’t like the situation, it didn’t give them opportunity to take control over the patent attorneys’ activity, who, I have to note, paid bills of the whole structure. And they maintained the office not bad, considering the number of immovable property has Kyrgyzpatent: three offices in different locations in the capital and each of them decently refurbished. Let me remind you that only around ten persons actually work directly with the applicants in the patent field and the rest is service personnel, who is paid solid checks of 2 thousand soms and higher.

The official director salary of Mr. Ulan Melisbek, according to him, is 13 thousand soms. Not much I have to say. But patent attorney, according to Mr. Melisbek as well, in 16 years of work became oligarchs. The trademark registration of the first class costs 375 US dollars and there are 45 of such levels. Usually applicant asks to register several classes once.

For his service patent attorney charges the amount equal to the fee, but sometime even more. There are thousands of registrations for industrial objects and intellectual property each year, if to count money in somebody’s pocket, then patent attorneys should earn very good money indeed. At least Mr. Melisbek is confident in it and we will trust his words, because he himself is one of them.

Newly appointed he made an attempt to change the state status-quo, which as he thinks a bit low. In order to reach his goal he used the method tested by his predecessors – through changing the legislative base by alteration of the Law “On Patent Attorneys”. The story is quite curious so we will look at it in detail.

How language freed from certifying commission

Have to confess at start, that I am telling the version of the director of Kyrgyzpatent, which was not disputed by anybody. So several years before the former head of the office Mr.Roman Omorov, obeying the trends of that times, introduced amendments about compulsory knowledge of the state language into the Law “On Patent Attorneys”. Furious patent attorneys made a decision to protect in the Constitutional Court their right to speak and work in the Language of Pushkin, which was recognized as one of official languages in the republic.

- I completely agree with this decision and I would do the same if I were them – told Mr. Ulan Melisbek about past events. – But what is interesting is that in the application on the cancellation of compulsory knowledge of Kyrgyz language the second point was appeal to abolish the attestation of patent attorneys. At that time this was the only state control lever over the activity of patent attorneys.

And what do think happened, the Constitutional Court, led by Mrs. Cholpon Baekova, restores the violated rights related to language, what is fair but along with it abolishes the one-in-two-years attestation of patent attorneys, the fact which has nothing to do with human rights violation. I am confident that this was well-calculated ruse, which was successful.

The attestation is worldwide practice, kind of exam for knowledge of constantly changing and updating international and national laws, rules and requirements. Patent attorney must be well informed about alterations in legal regulations. But in our country they were freed from this necessity.

And then the new director decided to restore the justice and initiated the law, but the parliament didn’t approve it. Mr Melisbek was disheartened by the defeat, he is supposes there was a lobbying from patent attorneys. But this failure didn’t kill his wish to continue planned reforms but now through administrative measures.

And first of all he prohibited to the patent attorneys, I will note here that they are not his subordinates, to be near the parliament. He told about it with clear threat on the meeting, notes of which were circulated on the Internet.

Spy in the house

Going back to this story, there is involuntary thought: what a great power is the virtual communication space. When one can put a compromising material into it and later publicly recant, that somebody used you. Aleksey Vandaev, the youngest and perspective patent attorney – hero and victim of the virtual scandal, which held in tension the whole intellectual property community of the republic during two weeks.

Firstly he recorded the meeting on fund raising for office work automation and then somebody put the record on the Internet. The immediate result was the reaction of the civil rights activists, accusing the head of the patent office in panel game. The day after the vent the hero of the sensation declared that he gave the record to other patent attorneys, but he didn’t say who left him vulnerable. Soon Mr. Vandaev on his own initiative left the position of patent attorney at all.

Some say that he was put pressure upon, others say that after the story was dead as a lawyer and attorney. Aleksey, who behaved himself according to the record quite independently and brave at that memorable meeting, today keeps silent. But Mr. Ulan Melisbek suggests that the young man was archly used and his career is ruined. Aleksey could shed a light on the truth but he doesn’t want. He was hurt most of all.

Last Friday husband and wife – Mrs. Fedorova and Mr. Pakhman – the oldest patent attorneys of the republic – initiated a press-conference. The reason for this was exclusion of Mrs. Fedorova from the register of Kyrgyzpatent. Disgraced attorneys are confident that, it is director’s punishment for refusal to contribute to the office work automation. As for the suspicion about publishing the record on the Internet, the pair categorically denies it..

- I even don’t use cell phone, not mentioning the Internet – explained Mrs. Fedorova.

What did want Mr. Melisbek?

The conflict between him and patent attorneys matured gradually, the apotheosis was that unfortunate meeting which was devoted to the responsibility distribution in financing the office work automation. The patent attorneys as literate persons immediately recognized the threat to their independence, the threat coming from new director. Reforms of Mr. Melisbek and his desire to reinforce control did not make them happy.

- There is lot of violations due to the lack of control – he says, - one leaves, disappears for years and doesn’t inform us. There was a case when patent attorney changed his citizenship and place of residence and still continued working in our field.

According to Mr. Melisbek, only seven attorney actually work, three of them are pioneers of the field and 90 percent of the market share belongs to them; the other four share 10 percent.

- I as a adherent of the market economy wish that income distribution was fairer – explains his position the head of the patent office, -but in order to do this we need to have a competition between patent attorneys so they can grow professionally. The most experienced among them are already 70 years. They don’t speak foreign languages, the skill which is necessary for this kind of work, they communicate with foreign clients by fax. Foreign partners are in perplexity: when people in Kyrgyzstan will learn how to use e-mail, when patent attorneys will have web-sites?

To turn a blind eye on this means to put up with indolence. And it is here at the time when high technologies are used by patent attorneys all over the world. They can not work with old methods because there is a strong competition. And the state regulates it, because it is interested in it.
In this case he is right, apart from Mr. Leonid Kim, the patent attorney, no one has own website. By the confession of Mrs. Fedorova and Mr. Pakhman, they have worked sixteen years without computer, automated system and in future can do without it.

- Web-sites are for advertisement, - they assure, - but we don’t need it, clients know us without it.
Meanwhile according to the record, not everyone thinks so. Colleagues of Mrs. Fedorova and Mr. Pakhman told that there is a need in office work automation and they need it first. Because of it there will be no need to have numerous correspondences with the specialists of Kyrgyzpatent and visit offices of officials. All issues can be solved in virtual space but the trouble started as usual because of money.

Forcing the automation

More precisely dispute started because of the contribution size of each party. The cost of the work was estimated in 150 thousands US dollars by programmers from Moscow. And this is a minimum. According to Mr. Melisbek, for the similar work Uzbek patent office paid 2 million US dollars.

There is no funds in the organization, was not provided in the budget and international organizations remained indifferent to help appeals. So he decided that he can obtain support from patent attorneys, who can afford to contribute for common good. But they immediately replied that they couldn’t raise 150 thousands. And 50 thousands is too much as well, but they could discuss the 25 thousand.

Officials were happy even for this: decided that even this amount will ease the work of stats-secretary – less money to ask from sponsors. But now the dispute within the attorneys’ community started, related to the distribution of the payment in 25 thousand US dollars. After very long discussions nothing was decided and they went to Kyrgyzpatent to settle the dispute. After all agreed that the ones who earn more, that contribute more. The biggest payments were left for the aces - Mrs. Fedorova, Mr. Pakhman and Mr. Kim, the troublemaker Vandaev was to contribute jus 150 US dollars.

Now the fundamental question is: Was Mr. Melisbek extorting or not for the automation? Yes, if we have in mind that voluntarily no one from not-poor patent attorneys wouldn’t give a cent, even realizing need to be up to date in the era of computerization. Unfortunately people who register innovations in technology and science, intellectual property, were not ready to embrace the greatest invention of humankind – IT technologies.

Another question is: for who did the director squeeze money? Just for himself to build a house or celebrate his son’s birthday? No, he did not. Perhaps, tomorrow in the course of structural reforms of the Government, he would be moved to another area…

In such a difficult situation Mr. Melsibek’s actions remind Peter I, who used “carrot and stick” (more stick) policy to inculcate western style in backward Russia. The Russian emperor ruled as despot but who cares? He has found a place in history as Peter the Great – reformer who “opened a window to Europe”.

But one can say that present time is completely different. Yes it is. Director – reformer had not enough patience, self-control, diplomatic talent, and administrative experience to find a common language with patent attorneys who are really unique as mentioned earlier. And it is quite unreasonable to lose any of them. Manners, frankness and petulancies of Mr. Melsibek irritate some people but are admired by others, since everyone can see that he is not indifferent and hardened official who cares of his place, but he is a real manager who wishes to get his country to the US level, where he had been living since he was a 16-year-old teenager.

But at the same time, this person raises protests due to his maniacal suspiciousness. To prevent any attempts to find compromising materials, he ordered the Kyrgyzpatent security service to search visitors with metal detector and to seize their mobile phones. This does not correspond to these modern ideas and habits that he gained in the most democratic country of the world.

Another matter is that people visiting Kyrgyzpatent, which is a civil institution, to examine themselves just like in airport. And then they complain to human right activists.

So who is the guiltiest in such a case?

“MSN”
Larisa Lee.
http://msn.kg/ru/news/29078/