Commissioner for Information of Public Importance Rodoljub Šabić evaluates that we should not too optimistically await the approaching publishing of the Annual Global Corruption Perception Index (CPI), that shall be organized by Transparency International by the end of this month in more than 180 countries of the world. It would be very good, but this is unfortunately of little probability that our country shall more importantly improve its mark in relation to the last year's one. Even the last year's mark in CPI, although the best so far, was still unsatisfactory, and classified us into the group of countries where corruption is a system problem. Therefore, whatever the mark in this year's CIP might be, it should be a basis for serious questioning of the things the state has done so far within anti-corruption efforts, and especially regarding the things it omitted to do.
In relation to that, the Commissioner Rodoljub Šabić especially stressed:
„In the last ten years, since our country has entered CPI evaluation process, our mark has improved from literally catastrophic 1.3 to 2.4, 2.7, 2.8, and 3.0 to the last year's also unsatisfactory 3.4. It is evident that there is some progress, but also that it is extremely slow and that with such a tempo it would take us too much time, which we can't permit, to reach mark 5.0, which is in the CPI scale ranging from 0 to 10 considered acceptable.
It is obvious that we need much more qualitative results in the fight against corruption. The achieving of results, besides strategies, laws and other normative documents also means implementation of globally confirmed principles, and of course, existence and action of effective institutions and mechanisms that must have at their disposal both authorizations and adequate material prerequisites.
However, practically all institutions that have anti-corruption role or potential work in inadequate, even extremely bad conditions. Especially worrisome is dramatically bad situation in which operate Republic Public Procurements Agency and State Auditing Institution, two bodies that should represent main anti-corruption levers in the public expenditures field, which is traditionally, in the global frameworks, the most attractive one for corruption and its perpetrators.
Public Procurement Administration has for the use of forty-some employees, working with large quantities of often delicate documents, only 150 m2 of office space. The State Auditing Institution doesn't have anything at all at its disposal. This problem hasn't appeared yesterday, but is evident for years, and it still hasn't been resolved. Such situation can not be simply tolerated, because it is not only detrimental for the reputation of those bodies and the state in general, but can also derive real repercussions as damage measured in hundreds of millions of euros, the damage those bodies, if they would function in normal conditions, could prevent.
In a similar way one should observe the obvious resistance, that is, lateness in affirming the principle of increased transparency, that is, of visibility of operations in the work of public authorities, especially speaking about handling public money and goods. The biggest number of problems appear in the public exactly in relation to these information. If one desires anti-corruption results, it is important, even necessary that obligation of all bodies in power should be confirmed in practice, of all who use public funds, that even without specific requests they should make an increasing number of such information on a routine, proactive basis available to the public in a specific, understandable, documented way, including their Internet publishing. It is however, understood that it is of the utmost importance that the highest and the most responsible Republic authorities should give a positive example in relation to that.“
