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Trainings on Corruption Proofing Held in Budva, Podgorica and Zagreb

Public Policy Researcher at Institute Alternative (IA), Ana Đurnić, held trainings on Corruption Proofing of Legislation.

Two trainings were held in Budva and Podgorica on April 24th and 25th, for representatives of Montenegrin local self-governments, ministries and the Parliament of Montenegro, while the third was held in Zagreb on May 22nd and 23rd for representatives of state institutions of Kosovo.

Ana spoke about the role of civil society in assessing corruption risks and presented the experience of Institute Alternative which has been engaged in these activities for more than ten years. The participants were presented examples of comments that IA prepared for a series of Montenegrin laws. Ana also presented the experience of IA representatives at various stages of drafting regulation, such as participation in working groups for preparing regulation, participating in public discussions on draft regulation, submitting initiatives for amending regulation to the MPs in the Parliament of Montenegro etc.

The trainings in Budva and Podgorica for representatives of Montenegrin institutions were organized by the Regional Anti-Corruption Initiative (RAI) in co-operation with the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC) and the Agency for the Prevention of Corruption (APC).

Tilman Hope also spoke at the trainings where, through practical examples, he introduced participants to the institute of corruption risk assessment in laws, its purpose and significance, so that representatives of state administration and local self-governments can recognize the mentioned risks when drafting normative acts in their everyday work.

Head of the Department for Monitoring Regulation and Giving Opinions on Anti-Corruption Regulation, Grozdana Laković, presented participants with the Methodology on Anti-Corruption Assessment of Laws, drafted through the RAI Regional Project. Laković presented in detail the Opinions given by the Department, which represent an initiative to the legislator or proposer to adapt legal norms so that their implementation eliminates corruption risks. Also, expert of the Regional Cooperation Council, Radu Cotici, emphasised in his presentation the importance of tackling corruption risk in legal norms, and that joint work and coordination of various subjects, both international and domestic – national, can lead to desired results and progress in the overall reforms that Montenegro is dedicated to.

Training in Zagreb for representatives of Kosovo’s state institutions was organized by RAI in cooperation with UNDP Kosovo and the Anti-Corruption Agency of Kosovo, in the framework of the RAI Regional Program for Strengthening Anti-Corruption Authorities and Civil Society for Combating Corruption and Organised Crime and Contribute to the UNCAC Review Process.

The main goal of the training was to find the best model for performing analyses of corruption risks in regulation by the Kosovo Anti-Corruption Agency.

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IA Representative Participated at the 7th POINT Conference

Ana Đurnić, our Public Policy Researcher, participated at the 7th POINT Conference on Political Accountability and New Technologies, held from May 17-19th in Sarajevo.

Specific topics and areas of the POINT 7.0 conference in the context of the use of new technologies were monitoring of government accountability, open data, success of civil society projects using new technologies, use of technology in advocacy, monitoring of different levels of government and many other topics.

Media literacy and “fake news” as well as the way readers can influence development of journalism in the digital age were the main topics of the conference.

The conference brought together representatives of civil society organizations and activists from the Eastern and South-Eastern Europe as well as other parts of the world, who work with the use of new technologies in advocating for accountable and transparent society.

The POINT 7.0 conference was organized by the ActionSEE Regional Network, comprised of Why Not? from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Center for Research on Transparency and Accountability (CRTA) from Serbia, Metamorphosis Foundation from Macedonia and Center for Democratic Transition (CDT) from Montenegro.

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Public Discussion Rendered Meaningless: 80% of Comments on the Draft Law on Public Procurement Rejected

During recently organised public discussion on the Draft Law on Public Procurement, almost 450 comments were received from over 20 different entities – bidders, contractors, civil sector, associations and business associations, almost 80% of which have been rejected by the Public Procurement Administration and the Ministry of Finance. Our key objection was also rejected, by which we asked for deletion of misdemeanour sanctions for authorities, so that citizens would not pay for mistakes of contracting authorities, and instead suggested that responsibility for violations of the Law is determined at individual level of responsible persons within institutions.

The recently held public discussion on the Draft Law on Public Procurement did not have much effect, since the Ministry of Finance and the Public Procurement Administration rejected most of the comments, with very vague and problematic explanations.

According to the Report on the public debate, these institutions received close to 450 comments, of which almost 80% have been rejected. Only 4.5% of the comments were entirely accepted, almost 13% was partially accepted, while 67 comments, or about 15%, “will be further considered”.

Out of 13 comments submitted in writing by the Institute Alternative, nine were not accepted at all, while four will be “further considered”, which does not mean that they will ultimately be accepted.

In the comments, we criticised very high misdemeanour penalties for violations of the Law on Public Procurement for authorities, and low ones for responsible persons within the authorities. Namely, prescribed penalties for determined misdemeanour liability of contracting authorities as legal entities amount to 5.000 to 20.000 euros, which will be paid by citizens – taxpayers. On the other hand, a penalty of 200 to 2.000 euros is envisaged for a responsible person within an authority. We believe that penalties prescribed in this way will not lead to real determination of responsibility, because contractors’ penalties will be paid by the citizens, while institutions will not suffer any damage or liability. Liability for mistakes and violations of the Law on Public Procurement should be established at individual level, and penalties should be retained and increased for the responsible persons within contracting authorities, and deleted for the authorities, in order to avoid the situation in which citizens would pay for mistakes of contracting authorities. However, our proposal was rejected, with the explanation that solutions from the Draft Law “point to increased responsibility of a natural person in a legal entity in the performance of public procurement activities”.

We also thought that the Law on Public Procurement should prescribe that the data from the Electronic Public Procurement Gazette (EPPG) will be publicly available, and that interested public will be able to search and collect data contained in this record, without monetary compensation. Electronic Gazette will replace Public Procurement Portal, and its establishment aims to improve the transparency of public procurement, which will only matter if citizens and interested public are able to use this database for free. However, this objection was also rejected, with explanation that “only the first publication on the EPPG will be free, while every subsequent publication is included in the price list for the publication of acts.”

In the comments, we also criticised the fact that the Law does not prescribe an obligation to publish reports on realisation of concluded contract. Bearing in mind that the area of control over execution of public procurement contracts is the least regulated and the least transparent one, we deemed that these reports should be made publicly available by prescribing an obligation to publish them in the Electronic Gazette. We consider that the Law should also prescribe penalties for contracting authorities if they do not respect this obligation. However, in the Report on the conducted public discussion, it was stated that “monitoring of contract execution is under the supervision of the public procurement inspector”, so the objection was not accepted.

The draft Law also prescribes that only procurement items whose estimated value is equal to or greater than 3.000 euros are entered in the Annual Procurement Plan. We pointed out that this provision is contrary to the Article 84, paragraph 1 of the Draft Law on Public Procurement, which stipulates conditions for initiating a public procurement procedure: “A contracting authority may initiate the public procurement procedure if funds for that particular procurement contract have been allocated by the budget or in some other manner in accordance with the law and if such procurement is envisaged by the annual procurement plan of the contracting authority.”

The proposed solution in practice means that, given that it is not in the annual procurement plan, it will not be possible to implement any procurement worth less than 3.000 euros without violating the Law. However, in the Public Procurement Administration and the Ministry of Finance, they do not see any reasons for deleting this provision and state in the Public Discussion Report that “proposed deletion of restrictions is unnecessary”.

Only our comments relating to the part of the Law regulating procurement in the field of security and defence will be “further considered”, as stated in the Report. However, our key suggestion to regulate these procurements in detail by the Law, and not by a by-law, was not accepted. The Ministry of Finance and the Public Procurement Administration maintain that these procurements will be “regulated in detail by the Decree on Defence and Security”, although we have repeatedly pointed out that this is contrary to the European Union Directive regulating procurement in the area of security and defence.

During the public discussion, we proposed that the Law should regulate in detail and prescribe procedures that can be applied to procurement in the field of security and defence, manner of collecting and evaluating bids, and criteria for evaluating bids. We also considered that a system of planning and reporting on these procurements should be regulated in detail, with a prescribed minimum of information that a plan and a report should contain. Bearing in mind secrecy that characterises these procurements, and the low level of control over them, we also proposed that the Law stipulates an obligation to submit security and defence reports and procurement plans to the Committee on Security and Defence to be advised of and give its opinion, and to the Government for adoption.

Ana Đurnić
Public Policy Researcher

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Press Release: Administrative Court to Urgently Review the Decision of the Agency for Prevention of Corruption that Jelić is not in Conflict of Interest

We filed a lawsuit to the Administrative Court for annulment of the Decision of the Agency for the Prevention of Corruption (APC) by which it found that Zoran Jelić, a member of the Senate of the State Audit Institution (SAI), is not in conflict of interest due to his engagement in the Prva Banka Crne Gore as a member of the Audit Committee for more than nine months during which he received close to 6.000 euros.

In the explanation of the Decision, the Agency did not address allegations from our Request that in the case of performing the function of the member of the Audit Committee of Prva Banka, having in mind job description and competences, as well as the amount and character of the compensation received by Jelić based on the membership in the Audit Committee, there is no doubt that it is a matter of performing professional activity, which is forbidden by the Law on the State Audit Institution.

Instead, the Agency explicitly claims that it is a matter of “scientific, educational, artistic and sports” activities under Article 9 of the Law on the Prevention of Corruption, and that a public official has the right to perform these activities and acquire income based on it and declare it accordingly.

However, in the disputed Decision, the Agency does not state clearly the kind of activity at issue, or whether the activity which Zoran Jelić performs in Prva Banka falls into “scientific”, “educational”, “artistic”, “sports” or “cultural” activity .

We consider that the Agency’s Decision is incomplete in this regard, and we argue that it is unlawful because according to the Register of Activities (6419 – other monetary intermediation) and provisions of a number of regulations defining the content of these activities, it is clear that Prva banka does not perform scientific, sports, artistic or cultural activity. Also, clear provisions of the Law on Banks regarding competences of Audit Committees indicate that neither the Audit Board’s competences fall in the scope of the said activities.

By the Decision in which it determines that performing activities and functions of a member of the Audit Committee of a commercial bank is not contrary to the provisions of the Law on the Prevention of Corruption, the Agency sends an open call to other members of the Senate of the State Audit Institution, as well as to other public officials to undertake such an engagement. This does not only undermine clear provisions of the Law on the Prevention of Corruption, but also broader societal goals of adopting and implementing the law, anti-corruption policies and integrity policies. It should be emphasised that the function of a member of the Senate of the State Audit Institution, unlike many other public functions, is particularly protected and privileged as it is a lifelong function with compensation in the pay grade of a Constitutional Court judge. In this sense, the legislator places a member of the SAI Senate among the highest state officials.

Additionally, the State Audit Institution is a constitutional institution that audits all other institutions and bodies and is therefore obliged to show the same or even higher level of integrity in its work and behavior than other bodies and institutions.

The Agency adopted the Decision based on our Request for initiating procedure for determining violation of the Law on the Prevention of Corruption in the part referring to completeness and accuracy of data in income and assets report and determining conflict of interest and restrictions in the exercise of public functions, dated 12th and 19th March 2018.

Stevo Muk
President of the Managing Board

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Inspectorate’s Decisions Have No Effect in Pljevlja: Vote Buyers Protected

With the use of legal loopholes, persons convicted in the “Audio Recordings Affair” in Pljevlja have been appointed to new positions, while persistent efforts have been put into rendering meaningless inspection findings. Institute Alternative warns about “potential political influence” on the decisions of the Administrative Inspectorate.

The Ministry of Public Administration annulled the conclusion of the Administrative Inspectorate according to which persons convicted for the “Audio Recordings Affair” are deemed unworthy to work as managers in Pljevlja municipal services.

Deciding on the complaint of the president of Pljevlja municipality, Mirko Đačić, at the end of last year, the Ministry found that “involvement of the administrative inspector is unclear” when it comes to assessing whether the convicted Sead Vesnić and Joka Đačić, as well as their colleague Goran Čavić, meet the conditions for holding acting positions in municipal secretariats and services.

In the explanation of the decision, which the Center for Investigative Journalism of Montenegro (CIJ-MNE) has seen, it is written that no regulation recognizes the institute of acting official at the local level. This means that the Ministry has not questioned the fact that the persons convicted by law were appointed as acting officials, although, according to this interpretation, they should not be appointed as the law does not recognize them.

The Ministry of Public Administration now claims for CIJ-MNE that during proceedings, this department, as a second instance authority, rejected complaint of the president of the municipality as groundless. However, they did not mention in their official responses that they had previously adopted Dačić’s complaint or what has happened in the meantime, although CIJ-MNE had an insight into this decision as well.

The Ministry also pointed out that after it rejected his complaint, the president of Pljevlja municipality initiated administrative dispute by filing a complaint before the Administrative Court against their decision and that this dispute is ongoing.

Joka Đačić, who was appointed Acting Head of the Civic Bureau, was sentenced to six months of suspended sentence for buying votes ahead of the 2014 local elections. Vesnić, appointed as the Acting Secretary of the General Administration Secretariat, received the same sentence for abuse of short-term assistance of the Center for Social Work ahead of the parliamentary elections two years earlier.

On the other hand, Administrative Inspectorate disapproved of Čavić because he had not passed a professional exam for managing the Protection Service.

The Inspectorate conducted municipal supervision at the end of 2016, following a report filed by Democratic Front.

At the same time, this was the only fully upheld complaint against the decision of the Administrative Inspectorate, which was adopted by the second instance authority – Ministry of Public Administration, headed by Suzana Pribilović. In regard of this, non-governmental organization Institute Alternative (IA) in the report “Towards Better Public Administration in Montenegro” warned of the potential political influence on the decisions of the Administrative Inspectorate.

According to the IA, the Law on Civil Servants and State Employees, which applies also to the local level, prescribes a criterion by which an authority cannot enter a work agreement with a person convicted of crimes that make them unworthy of performing these jobs.

“The Administrative Inspectorate recognized irregularities in regard to appointment to the leadership positions of persons who did not fulfil requirements because they were convicted of criminal offenses. However, after the president of the municipality filed an appeal, the Ministry found that the institute of acting official is not regulated by the Law on Local Self-Government and that the Law on Civil Servants and State Employees is applicable only to the rights and obligations of local officials. Accordingly, the Ministry considered that irregularities were not properly determined in the given case and annulled the decision of the Administrative Inspectorate, “as explained by IA.

This NGO claims that this case is illustrative for several reasons. First, they state that the established irregularity has been relativized by the fact that the appointed persons are not employees, but acting officials, and the application of regulations from the state to the local level is possible only in relation to employees. The IA says that the Ministry established that the institute of acting official as such does not exist at the local level, and has not taken a stance in regard to that and a number of other irregularities.

In its report, Institute Alternative concludes that capacities of the Administrative Inspectorate are still not fully realized, which is also reflected in its work pace. In support of this, they claim that in some cases, according to the collected data, reports are drafted four to seven months after the supervision.

“Strengthening the capacity of the Administrative Inspectorate is not only a priority in the public administration reform, but also a direct commitment of the Government under Chapter 23 (Justice and Fundamental Rights) of negotiations with the European Union. In the reporting period, the number of administrative inspectors has increased from a record low number of four administrative inspectors (in early 2017) to eight, which was the number of employees in March 2018, according to the latest published list of employees in the Ministry. This still represents just over half of the number envisaged by the act on internal organization and systematization of the Ministry, “reads IA report.

However, this NGO states that following the dismissal of the Chief Administrative Inspector, Dragica Anđelić, in March last year, the top position in this department remained vacant, as confirmed by the list of employees at the Ministry’s website.

According to the IA findings, reporting on the work of the Administrative Inspectorate is rather terse, so it is impossible to estimate how effective it really is in practice.

The Ministry’s statistics show that last year there were 438 supervisions conducted, of which 69 regular, 293 extraordinary and 76 control inspections.

IA highlights that, during this period, 266 irregularities were established. They consider this to potentially indicate a high proportion of irregularities that inspectors find during supervisions. According to monthly reports on the work of the inspection, submitted to IA, there are almost three times more remaining than removed irregularities.

IA gained insight into 15 complaints to the Administrative Inspection’s decisions. The Ministry reports that there were 27 decisions prepared based on complaints to the measures and activities undertaken by administrative inspectors, and 53 responses to the complaints were drafted last year.

Most of them were filed by the municipalities of Rožaje and Kolašin, which in 2016 was the most frequently controlled municipality, as earlier reported by CIJ-MNE.

In the Rožaje municipality, 46 irregularities were established last year, 24 control supervisions were conducted, and irregularities were not removed in 23 cases. This municipality has not answered CIJ-MNE to what extent they applied the Administrative Inspection orders, nor about the outcome of disputes they have initiated against this authority. The office of the president of the Municipality of Kolašin said that they have implemented every order of the Administrative Inspectorate that was based on law and justified.

“For those we considered to have no legal grounds, we initiated appropriate proceedings. Hence, an administrative dispute was initiated against seven orders for removing irregularities, of which three disputes have so far been completed, all three in favor of Kolašin Municipality. Also, administrative disputes were initiated against seven conclusions on sanctions, two of which have been completed, also in favor of the Kolašin Municipality, “reads their reply.

The Kolašin Municipality emphasized that the Administrative Inspectorate accepted their requests for delaying execution of conclusions on sanctions until the completion of proceedings, so the penalties that were “dropped” by the Administrative Court were not paid.

Ministers Complain Even About Symbolic Penalties

Besides the case of Pljevlja, the Ministry of Public Administration annulled, though partially, the decision of the Administrative Inspectorate after the appeal of Minister of Transport and Maritime Affairs, Osman Nurković.

In mid-2016, the Inspectorate pointed out to the then Minister of Transport and Maritime Affairs, Ivan Brajović, irregularities related to the dismissal of Mladen Lučić, tied to Social Democratic Party (SDP), from the position of the Director of the Port Authority and fulfilment of that position on the basis of a public call.

Vladislav Stjepčević (Social Democrats) replaced Lučić, and inspection found that he had received appointment decision days after the Government sitting, without waiting for the next sitting and verification of minutes from the previous one and started performing duties of the Director of the Port Authority “before the decision entered into force”.

As the Ministry of Transport and Maritime Affairs had not given notice of the measures and actions they undertook with view to removing the irregularities, the Inspectorate fined the Ministry with 500 and Brajović with 50 euros. Due to the non-implementation of measures from 2016, the Administrative Inspectorate re-imposed fines in September 2017, this time on newly appointed Minister, Osman Nurković, and, again, the Ministry of Transport and Maritime Affairs. They were fined 100 and 1000 euros respectively.

Nurković complained to the Ministry of Public Administration that the Inspectorate could have affected the removal of irregularities in a different way, even though, according to the position of the Government Department he leads, there were none. He also stated that at the time of the adoption of the decision in 2016, he was not a minister and that more lenient, minimal measures could have been applied. Nurković pointed out that the Inspectorate did not choose a minimum fine of 50 euros for physical and 500 for a legal person, “but it twice increased the statutory prescribed minimum even though Osman Nurković had not been punished previously.”

The Ministry of Public Administration, deciding on the complaint, partially annulled the Administrative Inspectorate’s decision in the part relating to 100 euros fine imposed on Nurković.

The Administrative Inspectorate said that they reduced the fine imposed on Nurković in the course of repeated procedure to the amount of 50 euros.

Employment in Rožaje Also Disputed

In 2016, the Administrative Inspectorate determined irregularities in the Municipal Police Service in the Municipality of Rožaje. At that time, inter alia, it was found that, five inspectors, municipal police officers and supervisors were permanently employed by a decision of the Mayor without a prior public call for fulfilling these positions. Some of them filed a complaint to the Ministry of Public Administration, but this department dismissed them at the end of last year.

CIJ-MNE earlier published that Rožaje municipality hired 189 persons in the period from 2014 to 2017 despite the fact that they signed a tax debt rescheduling agreement, and salaries are almost half a year late.

Author: Ana Komatina

The article was produced within the project “Civil Society for Good Governance: To Act and Account!”, Implemented by the Institute Alternative, Bonum, Nature, New horizon and Center for Research Journalism, and funded by the European Union within the Civil Society Facility , and the Balkan Trust for Democracy, a project of the German Marshall Fund of the US (GMF). The contents of the blog are the sole responsibility of the author and can not be taken to reflect the views of the donors.

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Breakdown in Communication Between Citizens and State in Provision of Public Services

Public services are the main point of contact between the public administration and the citizens of one country. While experts and civil society work with the issues of how professional the state administration is, is there corruption, are there regular assessments and trainings of civil servants, how does the accountability on different levels of hierarchy work, and how are strategies and laws made, for citizens, it is important how many times and how many different counters will they have to visit in order to get a document and realize a certain right. It is also important for them how long they will wait in a line and how the civil servants providing services treat them. And if it comes to citizens with reduced mobility, impaired hearing or vision, they will care about the possibility to physically access the premises where services are provided, will they be able to communicate with employees, and will the whole activity be carried out in a dignified way for them.

Serbia is one of the countries that in recent years, at least according to state leaders and media, pays great attention to improving the quality of public services and strives to simplify administrative procedures for its citizens. And indeed, the new LAP is adopted and being implemented (the famous Law on General Administrative Procedure adopted with a ten-year delay while in the meantime a decent, but with expired statute of limitations, LAP from nineties was being implemented), administration bodies have finally ceased to treat citizens as their couriers and have begun exchanging information from records kept ex officio. With the strong support of a special team at the Cabinet of the Prime Minister (so called “Delivery Unit”), innovative concept of pooling services based on life events has begun in 2015, and in this way babies in Serbia have finally become “welcome” for the state. The state shows its welcome to parents by enabling them to register a residence of a baby, its citizenship and health insurance, as well as to apply for parental benefits, all in one move, already at a maternity ward if they came up with a baby`s name at the time. The state sends parents a friendly welcome SMS and documents to their home address (the service was named “Welcome to the world, baby”).

However, what hides behind this bright surface? Are these innovations a reflection of the system or a result of individual reform efforts achieved by teams of dedicated people? Based on various analyses and researches carried out over the past year, it would appear that the system does not follow these modern solutions and that they work, not based on the system, but in spite of it.

Firstly, SIGMA (Program of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development which assesses public administration reform in the entire Western Balkans region) gives average ratings to Serbia in the area of public services. Indicators “Citizen-oriented Service Delivery” and “Fairness and Efficiency of Administrative Procedures” are valued “good” (3, on a scale from 0 to 5), while “Existence of Enablers for Public Service Delivery” and “Accessibility of Public Services” indicators are valued with a barely passing two. SIGMA points to weak capacities for monitoring public service performance, poor coordination of reform activities and uneven quality of registries on which modernization of public services depends on. Also, a complete lack of mechanisms to monitor the quality of public services and user satisfaction is criticized, as well as the lack of initiatives to involve users in service design. In addition, necessary data for monitoring accessibility to public services for vulnerable groups and its potential improvement is not collected.

Civil society projects further prove systemic problems. Research results within the regional project WeBER (par-monitor.org), coordinated by the Center for European Policies, and implemented by partners gathered in the network of think thank organisations “Think for Europe Network”, show that only one third of citizens think that the state asked them for suggestions on how to improve public services in the past two years or that as users of public services they have the possibility to give their opinion on their quality. As much as 80% of citizens – both in Serbia and Montenegro – say they were not given a possibility to give their opinion on the quality of services they received from the state in the past two years.

Within the framework of another project “Partnership for Public Administration Reform and Public Services”, implemented only in Serbia, it has been shown that although most citizens are generally satisfied with the quality of the services provided by the administration, they are very dissatisfied with work organization, waiting in lines, poor system for making appointments and poor equipment of institutions providing them services. They also mind petty corruption (informal payments and gifts) and verbal aggression, and they are poorly informed about their rights and mechanisms to protect them.

Results show that 77% citizens believe that people use private contacts in order to get faster and more efficient services of primary health care, while two thirds of citizens think the same when it comes to issuing personal documents. More than half (52%) of citizens of Serbia believe that informal payment and gifts are necessary to be provided hospital services, while every third citizen believes the same about the services of the Ministry of Interior. According to citizens, the most common abuses are corruption and verbal aggression.

Regarding citizens’ information, the results show that citizens believe that they are either uninformed or minimally informed of their rights and duties in the area of primary health care services (Chart 10). Also, almost more than half citizens do not know who to address in case of violation of their patients’ rights (49%), and a majority (56%) believe they need a higher level of information. d more than half (58%) do not know who to address in case of derogation of rights in contact with the police administrative service, and this figure is even higher among young people (between18 and 29 years of age). Citizens believe that media should inform them of their rights, but also employees in hospitals, police stations and pre-school institutions.

Citizens’ satisfaction results in regard to services and their lack of information are not surprising if taken in consideration the way strategies and laws are made in the areas in which these services are provided. Ministries mostly do not use analyses and data when working on these documents, and feedback from citizens – like the one mentioned above – almost does not exist and is not used for designing new policies and services. Also, citizens and civil society are not systematically involved in drafting strategies and laws: even if public discussions are held (and they are often skipped), they come only at the end of the document preparation process, which drastically reduces the possibility to amend already prepared draft or proposal. When amending a law, the situation is even worse: they are done randomly, that is, outside of the settled processes and procedures for adopting new regulations, although they often make substantive changes in the way that a particular area is regulated. Of the three analysed areas, the greatest progress in recent years in regard to use of analyses and data, and holding of public discussions, has been achieved by the Ministry of Interior, which can be explained by the great attention given to this Ministry’s area of work in the process of accession to the European Union, which makes them far more exposed to external analyses and assessments (by the European Commission primarily).

All of these findings clearly point to one thing: a lot of joint work by the state and civil society is needed so that citizens can really be “in the center of attention” of public administration when it provides them with services they themselves fund.

Milena Lazarević
The author is Programme Director of the European Policy Centre from Belgrade

The blog was produced within the project “Civil Society for Good Governance: To Act and Account!”, implemented by the Institute Alternative, Bonum, Nature, New horizon and Center for Investigative Journalism, and funded by the European Union within the Civil Society Facility and the Balkan Trust for Democracy (BTD), a project of the German Marshall Fund of the US (GMF). The contents of the blog are the sole responsibility of the author and cannot be taken to reflect the views of the donors.