Author: birnEU

The key panelists were Michael Davenport, the United Kingdom’s ambassador to Serbia, Louis Laurent Stokvis, the Netherlands’ ambassador to Serbia, Rodoljub Sabic, the Commissioner for Information of Public Importance, Tatjana Babic, the director of the Anti-Corruption Agency, Radoslav Sretenovic, president of the State Audit Institution, Radomir Ilic, special advisor at the justice ministry and representatives of other independent bodies. More than 50 state, NGO and media delegates took part in the debate.

Michael Davenport said that Serbia, with a corruption perception index of 39, is in 80th place out of 186 countries and is recognised as a highly corrupt country.

He emphasised the importance of independent bodies such as the commissioner, the ombudsman, the Anti-Corruption Agency and the State Audit Institution in the construction of high-quality anti-corruption mechanisms.

“All these bodies submit to the parliament their annual reports in which they indicate the identified problems and recommend how to resolve them. In that way they are helping parliament to fulfill one of its main roles, which is the control of the executive branch, and enable better public insight into the work of independent bodies,” said Davenport.

Louis Laurent Stokvis said that parliament has a key role to play in the fight against systemic corruption. He stressed that no country can be satisfied with a high corruption index, especially Serbia, which aspires to join the EU.

“The government and parliament can work together to eradicate corruption and it is necessary to create a practical structure for the systematic fight against corruption,” said Stokvis.

Rodoljub Sabic pointed out that it is a serious problem for democratic society if Serbia does not implement the conclusions made by parliament.

“After parliament has considered the reports of independent institutions and reached a conclusion about them, they become official. It is necessary to have a mechanism to implement these conclusions in practice,” said Sabic.

Radoslav Sretenovic, president of the State Audit Institution, said that the most frequent problems arise during the implementation of the law on public procurement. Sretenovic also emphasised that the authorities do not use the right to list public officials’ financial and non-financial assets.

Ana Jerosimic, a representative of the Anti-Corruption Agency, announced changes in the national anti-corruption strategy reporting process, the extension of the agency’s rights in the fields of supervision of the implementation of the strategy and more accountability for non-compliance with the strategy.

“The new strategy provides that the duty bearers submit to the Agency semi-annual and annual reports, as well as evidence of activities carried out. If the agency is in doubt whether something is done, it will have the right to seek additional verbal explanations,” said Jerosimic.

The conference was the third in a series of public debates addressing topics like corruption, health, education and the economy. The debates are part of the BIRN Serbia’s project to monitor election campaign promises.

The conference was organised with the support of the embassies of the United Kingdom and the Netherlands to Serbia.

The participants included 13 journalists and editors from eight municipalities and cities from this region.

The trainers and speakers were representatives of the EU PROGRES Programme, an expert from the Serbian government’s office for EU integration (SEIO), Zoran Sretic, and an assistant from Belgrade University’s political science faculty, Aleksandra Krstic. 

Sretic explained the details of Serbia’s progress towards joining the European Union, particularly the Interim Trade Agreement and the Stabilisation and Association Agreement.

The participants were mostly interested in finding out how these agreements will affect their own communities.

Serbian and European media coverage of the EU was the main topic of Krstic’s presentation. She explained in detail what kind of tools and information that could be useful for journalists are to be found on EU institutional web pages.

The next training will be organised from March 29-31 and involve a new group of participants. 

Tanja Maksic, project coordinator at BIRN Serbia, said that the results of the project’s monitoring showed that the election campaign promises that have been fulfilled so far are those relate to healthcare availability, expanding the list of free medicines and financial support to pregnant women.

“When it comes to the law on the protection of patients’ rights, it was not explicitly announced during the election campaign, but it was mentioned in the prime minister’s speeches. Also, I want to remind you that Serbia is the only country in the region that has not adopted this law,” said Maksic.

She added that the draft law on the issue defines in detail the rights of patients, but not their protection or any potential sanctions against those who violate them.

“The draft law on the protection of patients’ rights will be available to the government of Serbia by the end of March or early in April, while the law should be adopted by parliament during the spring session,” said Perisa Simonovic, state secretary at the health ministry.

Radmila Ivanek, special adviser to the health minister, said that several months of public debate had helped to improve the text of the legislation.

“In addition to the existing 11 rights, eight new rights are incorporated in the new law. Among them are the right to preventative measures, the right to quality health services, the right to a second opinion, the right to patient safety, and the rights of children in hospitals,” said Ivanek.

The topic of the patients’ rights protector and its relocation to local government under the new legislation caused most debate during the panel discussion. The law says the position will be relocated from healthcare facilities to local municipalities and that its name will be changed to patients’ rights advisor.

The Serbian ombudsman’s office, which supports the adoption of the law, pointed out some of the problems surrounding the current situation.

“The problem was that the protector, while working in health institutions, was also performing a numerous of other legal issues, therefore it’s important that this will be someone whose main activity will be protection of patients’ rights. It is also important to regulate the whole procedure, because in practice we were faced with situations in which its role was limited to forward complaints and responses among patients and doctors,” said Gordana Stevanovic, a representative of the ombudsman’s office.

But Marina Mijatovic, director of the NGO Legal Scanner, disagreed with the new name because the role of the position is not just to advise patients but to protect their rights as well.

The panel discussion was part of a project entitled Development of Mechanisms for Monitoring and Measurement of Government Policy, conducted under the auspices of the British Embassy in Belgrade.

“Nobody expected a breakneck shift in the field of education from the new government, but it feels that the issue remains on the fringes – there is a mismatch between expectations and the way in which this very important subject is treated in public,” said Dragana Zarkovic-Obradovic, the director of BIRN Serbia, during the debate entitled ‘How to Write Education in Serbian’.

Vlasta Matejic, one of the creators of the strategy which ensures that the state allocates 4.5 per cent of its budget to education, said it was “untrue that the Serbs are an educated nation” – a fact which is one of Serbian society’s biggest contemporary problems, he said.

According to Matejic, the development of education in Serbia depends on the courage of the state: “If we are bold enough, we will have better education, but if we allow politics to mix with education, we will have education as usual, and that’s not good,” he said, adding that the ultimate outcome is likely to fall somewhere between these extremes.

Matejic warned that there are many illiterate people in Serbia, and that “academic people do not even read their own works, nor [their] publications”.

Radivoje Mitrovic, state secretary at Serbia’s education ministry, said that education is not just a matter for the ministry and the state, but for all – from nurseries to universities, from pupils, students and parents to the economy and local governments.

Mitrovic said that it is very important that education is seen as an opportunity and a tool to overcome the current crisis.

A survey conducted by BIRN Serbia showed that education was very little represented as an issue in last year’s election campaign; it was mostly raised by the Serbian Socialist Party but absolutely sidelined by the Serbian Progressive Party and United Regions of Serbia coalition.

The panel discussion was part of a project entitled Development of Mechanisms for Monitoring and Measurement of Government Policy conducted under the auspices of the British Embassy in Belgrade.