E–transparency of the governments of Montenegro and Croatia Comparative analysis
Comparative analysis E–transparency of the governments of Montenegro and Croatia
Introduction E – transparency of the governments of Montenegro and Croatia – comparative analysis between Montenegro and Croatia is a part of the DURBIN project (Good governance – better institu tions) which deals with a key challenge for democratization in Montenegro – good governance. The project is financed by the USAID. Having a comprehensive and wellorganized website is inevitable nowadays in the era of expan sion and availability of information technology, because growing number of citizens satisfy their need for information via internet. A comprehensive and wellorganized website means that it contains all information regarding government’s work that can be searched for quickly. The analysis compares transparency of the Government of Montenegro website and that of the Government of the Republic of Croatia, and it was conducted in cooperation with the Croatian nongovernmental organization GONG. In the analysis, the data obtained based on the DURBIN monitoring results1, regarding trans parency of the Government of Montenegro, as well as on a part of the GONG’s 7th annual report on the implementation of the Law on Free Access to Information2 which studied informativeness and transparency of government institutions’ websites.
Etransparency through DURBIN A part of monitoring compliance to the good governance principle in government institutions dealt also with transparency of the Montenegrin government. We measured transparence through transparency of work, budget transparency, and access to information as well as through participation of nongovernmental organizations. For the needs of this analysis, we will present the results achieved in the field of transparency of work where we wanted to see whether all in formation on the Government’s work was published enabling to follow and evaluate the quality of its work. The monitoring was conducted in the period September – December 2012. Transparency of work was measured with a total of 13 indicators, 10 of which were related to the Government’s official website. The results show that the percentage of satisfaction of internet indicators is 54%, which means that the Government is now between being transparent and nontransparent, indicating that there are still a lot of areas and issues that need to be improved.
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www.cdtmn.org/images/2.Dokumenta_2013/durbinen.pdf i www.durbin.cdtmn.org www.gong.hr
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Comparative analysis E–transparency of the governments of Montenegro and Croatia
Satisfactory results were achieved in the areas of uptodateness and the website search options. Additionally, the website also contains information on the public relations office, and, following every government session, a report from each session is available with the summary of most im portant issues discussed. The major problem is that the documents regarding public procurement are not being published3 (General Secretariat). Although these documents are published on the public procurement por tal, we believe that in order to enable easier and faster access to information, it is very important to have these documents published on state institutions’ websites as well. In addition, the most important program documents are not being posted4 on the Government’s official website, and neither are the most important administrative documents5. Also, the websites contain no infor mation on regular pressconferences following the Government’s sessions, or on the objectives presented by the Government.
Informativeness and transparency of websites of Croatian government institutions As a part of the GONG’s 7th annual study on the implementation of the Law on Free Access to Information, a study was conducted on informativeness and transparency of websites of the Croatian government institutions, including the Government of the Republic of Croatia. The study was conducted in June and July 2012 and included 62 institutions. The total number of indicators was 31 and they were related to the following set of information: • Technical information indicating uptodateness and accessibility; • Information presenting the basic structure and the way the institutions work, in order to make them more understandable to the user; • Information on expenses and sources of funding of institutions showing the level of their accountability with regard to budget funds; • Information on various job vacancies; • Information on public procurement; • Information on inclusion of interested public in the decisionmaking process; • Information on registers and databases. A better result is achieved by the Government of Republic of Croatia with 77% satisfaction of indicators, which places it in the category of high transparency. Despite the results, GONG as sessed that there is still significant room for improvement.
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Invitations to public procurement procedures, decisions on awarding contracts in the public procurement procedures and public procurement contracts Development strategy and Report on Work are missing Organogram and scope of work are missing
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Comparative analysis E–transparency of the governments of Montenegro and Croatia
The website of the Government of the Republic of Croatia is updated on a regular basis and it contains, among other things, the documents regarding: legal regulations for the Government6 work, organi zational structure7, right to access information8, public procurement (only partially)9, budget10 (only partially), as well as documents regarding various job vacancies. In addition, you can also find a part of information on the Government’s work11, draft laws, as well as various registries and databases. On the website you will not find: information regarding inclusion of the interested public in the decisionmaking process, contracts and addenda to the contracts, reports on implementa tion of contracts on public procurements, audit reports for previous years, reports/evaluations on work, as well as the list of frequently asked questions.
Conclusion Compared data indicate that both countries face the same or similar problems regarding internet transparency, but that the Croatian government does more in this area than the Montenegrin government. That is indicated by the results achieved in these studies. DURBIN has showed that the Government of Montenegro is on the borderline of being transparent, while the study conducted by GONG indicates that the Croatian government is highly transparent. The differ ences between the two governments are obvious, having in mind that the Croatian government presents on its website the information regarding public procurement (although not all of it), has complete information on program and administrative documents, as well as: 1. Government’s Program of Work (visibly posted), 2. Documents regarding negotiations with the EU, 3. Information on activities on social networks, 4. List of most frequently used terms on the portal of the Government of the Republic of Croatia (in addition to the portal terminology, you can also find out more on the termi nology regarding the European Union), 5. Job vacancies, 6. Biographies of all members of the Government, 7. Instructions for using the portal of the Government ofthe Republic of Croatia. The Government of the Republic of Croatia is also leading the way when it comes to activities on social networks, since it has direct contact with its citizens on daily basis. Since the Montenegrin government looks up to the Croatian government in almost all aspects, especially regarding the European integrations, then it should also look up to it when it comes to transparency, primarily in the area of transparency of work through the official website. In addition, the Montenegrin government should increase its activity on social networks, the way their Croatian counterparts have done. 6 7 8 9
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Bylaws (regulations, decrees, codices…) and jurisdictions Organizational structure, employees – functions, names, contact information, biographies of leading officials Catalogue – guide, public relations officer contact information, web form for sending questions Plan of public procurement procedure for current year, list of public procurement contracts and statement on nonexistence of conflict of interest Budget for current year and report on implementation of budget for previous year Strategic documents and activities
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