In connection with the forthcoming Global Corruption Perception Index (CPI) which the Transparency International will publish tomorrow in more than 180 countries worldwide at the same time, Rodoljub Sabic, Commissioner for Information of Public Importance and Personal Data Protection, said that the optimistic expectations regarding Serbia's score unfortunately were not realistic.
According to the Commissioner, Serbia's score on this years' Index would be another cause to review inadequate relation of all levels of the Government towards anti-corruption potential of transparency, i.e. the need to improve visibility of operations, particularly disposal of public money and goods. In connection with that, the Commissioner also said the following:
"Serbia's score on this years' Global Index can be at the last years' level (3.4 on a scale of 1 to 10) or insignificantly, marginally better. In any case, it will point to robust system corruption and will be far below the "passing" 5.0. Of course, we must not and cannot be satisfied with that and it demands reassessment of the dominant "concept" of the fight against corruption.
This is supported by the fact that last year a large number of police and law enforcement activities in connection with numerous corruption cases and "scandals" were registered. However, it is not enough to reduce corruption to an "acceptable" level and to change our society's image of a highly corrupt society. It is an illusion to believe that only repressive measures can curb corruption because repressive measures deal with consequences and not with causes, i.e. the social environment which causes corruption. Extremely slow improvement of Serbia's score on CPI (it took us a decade to improve it by 1.0) undoubtedly indicates the necessity of use of preventive measures, particularly anti-corruption potential of the public.
This is why I as the Commissioner would in cooperation with the Ombudsman and the Anti-corruption Agency insist on the fact that the Government must affirm much faster than before the principle which implies that information on disposal of public money and resources must be made available to the general public. Starting from the past experiences, we will jointly make efforts to ensure that law enforcement agencies see cases of illegal denial of such information or refusal to make them available to the public even after binding orders from the Commissioner for Information or a court as very indicative phenomena in terms of corruption and to react according to that."
