Source: Blic
The Government has to ensure the control of all state secrets
The proposal of the Law on Confidential Information might be withdrawn from the Parliament if the expert public offers ‘enough evidence that the proposal violates the Constitution and citizens' rights', this was announced yesterday at a public debate by Gorana Pualic, State Secretary within the Ministry of Justice.
Rodoljub Sabic, the Commissioner for Information of Public Importance, Sasa Jankovic, the Ombudsman, Radoslav Sretenovic, State Auditor, and Cedomir Cupic, the President of the Anti-Corruption Agency board, requested yesterday that the law proposal be withdrawn from the Parliament because, in their opinion, it limits their access to all confidential data, suspends the right of the Commissioner and the Ombudsman to execute laws and regulations, and goes against the Constitution itself.
Supervisory duties are being transferred onto a Government's expert department. This is unacceptable for the expert public as it leads to executive power strengthening to the detriment of the Parliament. Cupic and Sretenovic claim that this law proposal is detrimental to the work of the State Auditor Institution and the Anti-Corruption Agency:
- Our scope of work is to uncover secret malpractice and that is why we are asking for the State Auditor Institution to be included in this law proposal. Without any authority - we cannot perform our duties - said Sretenovic. The President of the team who worked on this proposal Vladimir Cvijan stated that the solutions outlined in the law did not differ from other European laws, and that it was never too late to change certain segments of it if valid arguments were presented.
- If they provide valid evidence that the power they are asking for is within the scope of their work, they will get it. Without any evidence, this kind of power would have to be given to the President of the republic too, and I do not want to do that - said Cvijan.
- If the law proposal is not withdrawn and certain suggestions that limit the work of the aforementioned institutions changed, information, such as those in the case of Slavko Curuvija's murder, could remain secret forever. Citizens then have to believe the word of the security services and other institutions without having an option to ask someone who is obligated to keep a secret to check its truthfulness for them. Even the Sociodemocratic League of Vojvodina believes that the proposal should be withdrawn from the Parliament as it goes against the Constitution, the international standards and the laws regarding the Ombudsman and the access to information.
