Year: 2015

Local self-governments in Montenegro have continued the practice of non-rational employment in 2014, although they did not even adopted the analysis on maximum number of officers, nor the plan to reduce the number of employees, which had to be done until the end of last year.

All municipalities, with the exception of Andrijevica, Danilovgrad, Mojkovac and Šavnik, have conducted the recruitment procedures during 2014, even though did not meet the formal prerequisites for this. None of the municipalities implemented the obligations stipulated by Public Sector Internal Reorganisation Plan. In order to reduce the number of employees, municipalities were required to prepare and produce an analysis of the optimal number of employees that would further lead to the adoption of new regulations, as well as to the preparation of the plan of rationalization. Although the deadline expired for all three obligations, municipalities have responded to our request that they are not in possession of the aforementioned documents, or that they are currently working on their preparation. According to official data, there are currently at least 2300 supernumerary employees in the municipalities, although the number could be higher, since the projections are made without previous analysis which have not yet been conducted.

When asked about the total number of employees, local governments do not submit data for employees in state companies and institutions, but only for the central administration. Municipality of Žabljak has refused to answer to our request on this basis. According to information submitted by the municipalities to the Institute, on 31 December 2014, there were 3772 officers and employees in total working in local administrations (not including data for Bijelo Polje, Žabljak and Gusinje). Previously published data from the Ministry of Finance show that in September 2014 the total number of employees, including state institutions and companies founded by the municipality, was 11,778, which is 1,270 more than in 2012.

The municipalities that admitted the highest number of employees in the last year were Podgorica, Pljevlja, Herceg Novi and Nikšić. Municipality of Cetinje has not provided us with information on the number of officers who have been employed throughout the last year, with the explanation that we can access the data only in their premises. Municipality of Bijelo Polje has not responded to our request, continuing, thus, to violate the legal obligation to submit information on the basis of free access to information.

Jovana MAROVIĆ
Research coordinator

The effect of the Law on Civil servants and State employees to establishing the merit based system in the state administration are limited due to inconsistent application of new regulations and weak competition during the recruitment, as assessed today at the press conference organized by Institute Alternative (IA).

The press conference was organized withing the project “State Administration in Montenegro – Equal for All”, supported by U.S. Embassy in Podgorica.

Its aim was to present the findings of the monitoring of recruitment and promotion in state administration in 2014.

“What we mean by the inconsistent application of the rules, is the broad interpretation of the discretion of Head of state authority not to select the best candidates assessed, superficial assessment of employees, and other formal, but also quite a severe flaws in the management of human resources,” said Milena Milošević, public policy researcher in IA.

She particularly pointed out the fact that a low number of candidates applying to the calls – on average, 2 candidates for last year, which imposes shortening the selection list, which currently makes five candidates with highest ranking among which the Head makes the final decision.

“The promotion at work of civil servants and state employees practically does not exist”, Milošević said, pointing out to the fact that according to the information available and the Central personnel register and the data to which the IA had access during monitoring in the past year there have been no decision on promotion.

“The legal provision according to which the promotion is made is on the basis of excellence at work which is only possible in a higher salary grade, is clearly not the right answer to the needs of motivating and retaining the most professional personnel,” she added.

Transparency procedures of the verification of abilities are at a high level. Human Resources Management Authority regularly publishes detailed reports on its website, it was assessed at the conference.

During the monitoring, in addition to the information available through the Human Resources Management Authority and The Appeal Commission, IA has focused on a total of 18 state bodies in order to map the key challenges in the implementation of the Law on Civil Servants, when it comes to recruitment and promotion procedures.

However, when it comes to the higher level of government bodies, it is more difficult to get information, because of the high cost of the procedure of access to information, for which IA had to pay more than 500 euros. Ministry of Defense refused to provide the names and surnames of employees, who have been recruited during 2014.

The Ministry of Health did not even respond to a request concerned the recruitment in the state organs for the second half of 2014, it was noted at the event.

Even when there is competition in recruitment, Heads often decide to exercise its discretion and not to choose the first-ranked candidate.

However, Milošević pointed out that the Heads often use this possibility very often, although it should be the case only exceptionally when they have precise explanation for that

In some cases, they often state the reasons that do not even have the foundation in the Law. For example, for the selection of candidates they use criteria that are directly in conflict with the principle of recruitment based on merit or criteria that have already been a part of the verification capabilities performed before the specially established commission.

Ana Đurnić, project associate in IA, announced the launching of Internet website mojauprava.me.

This site, which will also be launched by the IA within the project “State Administration in Montenegro: Equal for All”, will contain, in addition to an interactive component that will allow citizens to report problems when it comes to employment in state bodies, a graphic representation of the key steps and mechanisms to protect the rights of candidates for a job in state bodies.