TI BiH strongly condemns the efforts of the RS Government to influence the work of the Auditor General

International Bosnia and Herzegovina (TI BiH) strongly condemns non-adoption of the  report on the work of the Supreme Office for the RS Public Sector Auditing and the conclusions of the RS National Assembly adopted November11th, which ask for an external control of this office. Such moves represent an obvious attempt to limit and control the work of the auditor, which has been the only office so far who pointed out to irregularities in the operations of public institutions and whose reports have so far been adopted.

The initiative of the ruling party to increase the RS Government control over the work of Audit Service is also evidence that the Government of the RS, after negative assessments given to some of its ministries, wants to stop this service in further efforts to prevent irresponsible spending of funds and increase accountability in the operations of these institutions. This becomes especially apparent when taking into account that the Ministry of Finance, which received a negative assessment in the last report, is leading in these efforts to discredit the work of the supreme auditor, and to give this the ministry greater powers in relation to the work of the audit. If we add the fact that the Investment-Development Bank of the Republic of Srpska, which is controlled by the Ministry of Finance, received a highly negative assessment in the audit report, the motives behind these decisions become even clearer.
At the session of the National Assembly conclusions were adopted that require the external control of auditing office, and it becomes questionable which agencies would carry out this control and whether it is possible to avoid the influence of government in the process of auditing of the audit itself.

Steady practice of the Government of the RS to directly dismiss all institutions and individuals who indicate irregularities in its work is proven in this case, and judging by recent information of the Government of RS in which it directly seeks to discredit all the organizations that have in the past criticized the work of the government, it is obvious that this practice is getting more and more invigorated. Conclusions of the National Assembly are again trying to put the institutions in the service of the interests of ruling elite, and the fact that these moves are trying to take away the independence and integrity to the only service that has acted independently so far, leads to a conclusion that the RS is increasingly moving away from democracy, and is increasingly becoming a dictatorship.