Strengthening the role of civil society in the fight against corruption

Within the project "Local Transparency Booster: Raising Accountability and Prevention of Corruption in Local Governments”, Belgrade Open School in partnership with Toplica Center for Democracy and Human Rights organized Capacity Building Programme for local CSOs „We Have Something against Corruption“ in Vrnjačka Banja from 9th until 11th March and from 11th until 13th March. This programme gathered 50 representatives of local CSOs, who had opportunity to attend sessions about importance of civic participation, proactive transparency of public authorities, monitoring of public finances, data visualization, about role of civil society in the fight against corruption and also about the role of state institutions in area of free access to information of public importance and audit procedures of local government's budgets.

The programme was opened by Vesna Đukić, general director of Belgrade Open School, Milorad Bjeletić, executive director of Belgrade Open School, project team members Sanja Nasevski, Mihailo Gajić and Jovana Tripunović as associate of Belgrade Open School and Dragan Dobrašinović from partnership organization Toplica Center for Democracy and Human Rights. Sessions were held by Rodoljub Šabić, Commissioner for Information of Public Importance and Personal Data Protection, Duško Pejović, supreme state auditor from State Audit Institution; Miodrag Milosavljević from Open Society Foundation, Danilo Milić from Olof Palme International Center, Dragan Dobrašinović from Toplica Center for Democracy and Human Rights, Aleksandar Đekić from Becej Youth Association, Sanja Nasevski and Mihailo Gajić from Belgrade Open School and Jovana Tripunović as associate of Belgrade Open School.

Participants discussed about recommendations for improvements of proactive transparency, advocated by Belgrade Open School and Toplica Center for Democracy and Human Rights. This recommendations envisage amendments of Law on free access to information of public importance and proactive publishing of frequently required information of public importance.

Project "Local Transparency Booster: Raising Accountability and Prevention of Corruption in Local Governments” is implemented by Belgrade Open School in partnership with Toplica Center for Democracy and Human Rights, in association with Standing Conference of Towns and Municipalities with support of The Delegation of the European Union to the Republic of Serbia. Project is co-financed by Serbian Government The Office for Cooperation with Civil Society. You can find more information about project "Local Transparency Booster: Raising Accountability and Prevention of Corruption in Local Governments“on web page www.dostup.no