Source: Danas
The famous Report about the Good Management of the Government for 2006 was published recently in Washington in the headquarters of the World Bank with positive marks given to Serbia. This is a document which the World Bank has been publishing every summer for the past ten years, which is a result of consideration and evaluation of several factors which are the presumptions of good management. Observation is made with respect to the efficiency of the administration, civilian freedom, political stability, legal regulations, corruption control and rule of rights. The marks range from the worst - 0 to the best 100 and the Report covers practically all countries in the world, over 200. The publication of this report has always drawn attention of the public and has drawn special attention in our country this year, greater than ever before. The explanation is probably in the fact that Serbia has been desribed in this year's report as a state in which an improvement is evident, particularly with respect to the control of corruption. The evaluations given in the report have caused a wide variety of reactions in our public. Even a superficial analysis of the publicly presented views and stands of experts or comments of anonymous citizens on the web sites of the various mass media confirms equally the obvious ambivalence - from a manifestation of pleasure to a sceptical attitude, even absolute disbelief in the objective grounds of such evaluations, particularly when it is a question of the control of corruption. The mark ''good'' given to the control of corruption caused a sour smile in many. Because there are many who, I believe justifiedly, believe that the actual situation in our country is such that we will not have for a long time yet justified reasons to be satisfied with the results achieved in the fight against corruption. But, this does still not mean that the subject report of the World Bank should be underestimated. This is a document of undisputable specific value, result of extensive research, based on the evaluations of a significant number of financial institutions, specialized non-governmental organizations and experts of authority. And whatever we may think of ourselves, we are objectively in a situation in which it is much more important what others think of us - above all the relevant international factors, what the World Bank certainly is. Of course, just as these evaluations of the World Bank should not be underestimated, they should also not be overestimated. They should be placed in an actual context and treated as a potential, as something which may be worth a lot, but on condition that it is valuated, that it be confirmed by other relevant evaluations. When we are speaking about the actual context, it would serve as an illustration to make a comparison of the marks we were given with the marks given, for example, to Croatia. The marks given to the two states for administration efficiency were 44.5 (69.7), whereby the mark in the brackets is for Croatia. Civilian freedoms have been marked with 51.4 (61.1), legal regulations 40.5 (61.5), rule of rights 35.2 (52.9), political stability 24.5 (62.0) and finally corruption control 46.1 and 58.3. Croatia as an aspirant for membership in EU is closer to achieving this goal, however not much closer than us, at least following the widely shared view in our country. In such a state of the matter the above presented marks and differences between them show, even without any special comments, that we do not have too many reasons for pleasure. However, no matter what the comparison of our marks may be with the marks of the other countries, the fact that they are better than the ones given last year may be very useful. Because, although the Report about good management does not represent an official document of the World Bank in the strict formal sense, there is still no doubt that it represents a widely used basis in the decision process about the allocation of funds for aid from the World Bank and a respectable orientation for business people, i.e. investors, on which the scope of the very needed foreign investments may depend among other things. It is therefore very important that the positive trend in the control of the corruption, which is indicated or at least point out to by the evaluations from the report of the World Bank, be confirmed by similar evaluations at the coming ''tests''. The first one will take place very soon, in just a few months. At the beginning of November the Transparency International, a global anti-corruption network of non-governmental organizations, will publish its Index of perception of corruption. The authority of the Index among those dealing with anti-corruption activities, as well as among business people, bankers and investors is certainly undoubtable. There is therefore no need to point out how significant it is that it should confirm a positive trend in the fight against corruption. Another important ''test'' will probably take place in the first half of next year. This means the execution of the GRECO recommendations. A big anti-corruption initiative gave our country end of 2005 a group of recommendations of binding nature with a set time frame for their execution by the end of this year. Considering that there is no doubt that the attitude towards these recommendations will have a big impact on the evaluation of the international public of the control of the corruption in our country, it is very bad that the situation related to such execution is not good at all. It is high time that we face this responsibly and improve the situation by taking energetic action as much and as fast as possible. In relation to this it is worth reminding that the anti-corruption concepts on which both the Transparency and GRECO insist give great significance in the fight against corruption to transparency, insight into the operation of the authorities and accessibility of information in this operation. In this context the impermissibly large amount of information which it is hard for our public to get an access too, is not just a matter for concern, but also an obvious indicator as to where good and quickly achievable results in the fight against corruption should be looked for. It is necessary to enable the public without delay to have the widest possible free access to information about disposal with financial and material public goods. The experience of the others confirms that this would give us numerous useful effects. Including also that the future reaction to the evaluations about the control of corruption would not be ironic or with a sceptical smile, but justifiedly with a smile of pleasure. The author is the Commissioner for Information
