Conference “Public Procurement in Macedonia: Experience and draft legislation for improvements”
13/01/202116
Press release
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Research on Public Spending
Center for Civil Communications (CCC) published its research titled Law or Politics: Selection of Management and Supervisory Board Members at State-Owned Enterprises.
In 2018, state-of-affairs related to public procurements in Macedonia are still trapped between the valid “old” and heavily criticized Law on Public Procurements and the already drafted “new” law that should “correct” matters, but is still pending enactment by the Parliament of the Republic of Macedonia.
SKOPJE, 4 September, 2014 – Today, the Centre for Civil Communications published the monitoring results for public procurement procedures in Macedonia for the periodApril-June 2014. Key findings include: Multiannual trend of decreasing number of appeals lodged by companies in front of the State Commission on Public Procurement Appeals (SCPPA) is discontinued. In the first semester of 2014, SCPPA was presented with a total of 330 appeals, accounting for an increase by 13.4% compared to the same period last year. Also, for the first time in several years, high share of decisions taken by SCPPA imply approval of appeals. Significant share of bids submitted in tender procedures do not reach the bid-evaluation stage. In that, reasons indicated for rejection of bids include administrative shortcomings of bids submitted and failure to fulfil requirements defined in relevant tender documents (eligibility criteria and terms and conditions defined in tender specifications). Recently adopted law amendments in effect from January 2014 have yield expected results in reducing the share of contracts signed by means of negotiation procedure without previously announced call for bids, but are still ineffective in terms of reduced number of tender annulments. In the second quarter of 2014, the total values of direct contracts accounts for 10.5 million EUR, and 22.4% of all announced tenders were annulled. Competition is still on unsatisfactory level. Only 47% of tender procedures from the monitoring sample were completed with e-auction. This Report is available here. For more information, please contact the Centre for Civil Communications on tel. (02) 3213-513 or by e-mail: center@ccc.org.mk. NOTE TO THE EDITORS: USAID...
The EU-funded project improved and raised awareness about the importance of having greater access for journalists to public information in order to increase the quality of public information and to promote freedom of expression and independent media. The right to know is the fundamental right of journalists and all citizens should have access to information held by public bodies. The project built on positive experience of NGOs and journalists from EU member states. It worked directly with the journalists on strengthening their role as public watchdogs through exercise of their right to free access to public information. Results achieved: Increased journalists’ awareness for the importance and possibilities of the powerful tool of independent media – Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), which is currently under-used by the media. Enhanced journalists’ skills for greater use of the FOIA More fact-based and substantiated news reporting through greater use of FOIA Proposed legal changes to FOIA toward shortening the deadline for answering to the requests for information in alignment to other European countries. The project is implemented by the Center for Civil Communication in cooperation with Access Info Europe and the Balkan Investigating Reporting Network BIRN.
Research on the application of the right of free access to public information on the part of journalists
29/10/201212
Being an advocate for transparency, accountability and responsibility of the institutions, the Center for Civil Communications remains dedicated to the efforts for strengthening the role of the media in society, bearing in mind that they are of vital importance for the democracy and for creating conditions for a responsible and accountable working of the government officials.
TRANSPARENT LOCAL GOVERNANCE: BOOK OF PRACTICES AND RECOMMENDATIONS One of the main goals of decentralisation is to make the local authorities more responsive to the needs of the local communities. Still, six years after the start of the process, surveys show that citizens remain unsatisfied with the manner in which the local self-government deals with their problems and how it organizes the life and work of local communities.In majority of municipalities in the country, the citizens are not participating sufficiently in the decision making processes and creation of local policies, while local authorities are not sufficiently transparent, accountable and responsible in their work. In addition, the citizens are not well informed about the role and importance of municipal administrations in local communities. Therefore, there is a need to provide assistance to the municipal administrations to develop and implement more efficient mechanisms for more transparent, accountable and responsible work, and instruments that will allow for and stimulate regular participation of citizens, local business communities and non-governmental organisations in decision making process and creation of local policies. On the other hand, there are municipalities that implement certain successful practices that yield results and serve as positive example for the other municipal administrations. For more than a year, three Macedonian nongovernmental associations – the NGO Infocentre, the Centre for Civic Communications and EHO, with the support by USAID, work to increase the mutual confidence and cooperation between citizens, business people, civic organisations and local authorities in Macedonia, through introduction of instruments to ensure more transparent, accountable and responsible operations of...
flickr_albumid=[72157623090003191] Today, the Center for Civic Communications presented the fourth quarterly Report on the results of the public procurement process monitoring, which besides the regular analysis of public procurement procedures, also contains an analysis of the legal protection in the public procurement procedures. The report, inter alia, noted: Despite its legal obligation, some state institutions, including ministries, did not provide a notification for an agreement for public procurement to the Public Procurements Bureau. The number of government institutions that are not providing data to the Public Procurements Bureau on the incurred costs of 20,000 or 50,000 euros for the procurement of goods and services is increasing. The problem with the delays in reaching the decision to choose the most favorable bid is getting worse. Out of a total of 40 monitored public procurement procedures in this quarter, a decision for choosing the best offer has not been made in 13 cases (33%), and the time delay for reaching a decision in these procedures ranges from 50 to 120 days. The problem with the nullification of public procurement procedures is being mitigated. Out of a total of 40 public procurement procedures, 7 procedures have been completely or partially annulled (17.5%), leading to a certain mitigation of this problem compared to the previous quarter, when 25% of the procedures were annulled. Although increased, the usage of the electronic public procurement system in the last quarter of 2009 is still not on a satisfactory level. In 2009, only 2.5% of the procedures have been conducted through the electronic...
Results of the survey of existing practices in municipalities in Eastern Macedonia: Štip, Strumica, Sveti Nikole and Vinica The NGO Infocentre, Centre for Civil Communications and EHO implement the „USAID Project for Transparent Governance“, in the period September 2009-August 2012. Starting from the point that greater transparency, responsibility and accountability are the best instruments to fight corruption, this project aims to contribute to revitalisation of mechanisms for more transparent, responsible and accountable work of local governments, increased participation by citizens and business community in local decision-making processes, and exchange of good practices between local self-governments in the country. The first phase of the project includes a survey of current practices applied by local self-governments in four pilot-municipalities in Eastern Macedonia. The survey aims to provide relevant indicators on citizens’, civic associations’ and business community’s satisfaction with the services provided by the municipalities, and to detect eventual weaknesses in the work of the municipalities in terms of transparent, efficient and accountable work. The satisfaction of citizens, NGOs and the business community were measured through: How well informed they were about the work of municipal administrations; Their involvement in decision-making processes; Possibilities they have to point out at weaknesses in the functioning of municipal administrations and the work of public servants; and Accountability they get from the municipality. The opportunity that, in addition to users, representatives of municipal administration were given to present their own views on the efficiency of provision of services allowed us to gather information on the existence of a system of procedures and...