BiH Joined the OGP Initiative

Sarajevo, 26^th September 2014 – In the past two years, Transparency International Bosnia and Herzegovina along with the Foundation CPI (Centre for Public Interest Advocacy), the Center for Social Research Analitika, the Centre for Investigative Journalism and the Open Society Fund of BiH have organized numerous activities and initiated advocacy in order to ensure BiH  enters the Open Government Partnership Initiative, and at the meeting in UN Headquarters, held on 24^th September 2014,  BiH was formally introduced as a new member of the Open Government Partnership. This also represents an official confirmation of BiH intentions to make additional efforts in terms of transparency and openness of government, as well as cooperation with citizens and civil society in accordance with the objectives of economic and social development of the country on the path towards European integration.

BiH accession to the Open Government Initiative represents a confirmation of the outstanding advocacy efforts of the TI BiH and partnership organization made during the accession process. In the past two years, TI BiH has actively been engaged in advocacy and education of the government and civil society regarding the OGP Initiative, and also gave its contribution to BiH accession to the Initiative. In cooperation with mentioned organizations, TI BiH has organized regional workshops in order to present specifics of the Initiative to the public and government representatives, as well as the experiences of the countries in the region. Successful connection with the institutions and organizations was also achieved as well as the participation in global and regional OGP summits, the education was provided along with many other activities.

The next step of BiH, in which TI BiH will actively participate, is to make the Action Plan, which will precisely define issues that have to be worked on in order to achieve the set of principles and improvement in the areas defined as problematic. The issues will be defined by the representatives of the government and civil society – the focus of whole idea of the OGP Initiative is the cooperation and co decision.

The action planning and all forthcoming steps that BiH must take will be presented on the next conference that will be organized by TI BiH on the occasion of the International Right to Know Day, which will be held in Sarajevo on 29^th September 2014. The representatives of the government and civil society will be informed of the procedures of adoption of the action plan and outline of future plans and activities.

Formal accession of BiH to the Open Government Partnership initiative represents the test for the government institutions and their commitment to transparency, considering that the phases of planning and implementation of the concrete measures are to occur in the future. TI BiH will continue with the active engagement in this area and expresses the hope that BiH’s Action Plan for the OGP Initiative will not be one in the series of documents which were adopted but not applied.

BiH Joined the OGP Initiative