The willingness of the management of institutions key to the government openness

Results of the cooperation with the institutions regarding the strengthening of openness and proactive transparency were presented by TI BiH and the Coalition of NGOs at the conference „Partnership for the Open Government in BiH“

Sarajevo, 19th April 2016 — Transparency International in Bosnia and Herzegovina (TI BiH) together with the Coalition of NGOs presented today the results of their survey on the readiness of institutions to open data, as well as the results of the activities conducted by the institutions and civil society organizations in the field of proactive transparency and participation of citizens in decision-making process.

TIBiH, CPI Foundation, Center for Social Research Analitika and the Association of Citizens Why Not had previously worked together in the development of a dialogue and promotion of the open data and proactive transparency in the work of public institutions through the empowermentpossibi of their capacities in the project supported by the UK Government. „Only more transparent, responsible and open governments may serve their citizens“, it was pointed out at the beginning of the conference during the presentation of the results of work with the institutions.
TI BiH implemented the program that consisted of 6 modules to strengthen the capacities of the institutions in the field of proactive transparency, open data and communication with the citizens. The following institutions were involved in the program: the Ministry of Justice of BiH, the Agency for Prevention of Corruption and Coordination of the Fight against Corruption in BiH, the Communications Regulatory Agency of BiH, the BiH Central Election Commission, the State Investigation and Protection Agency and the Audit Office of Institutions of Bosnia and Herzegovina. All of them have made a progress in a very short time in terms of proactive disclosure of documents. During the presentation of the results SIPA achieved in this project, Kristina Jozic, a public information officer of this institution, emphasized that the key driver to more transparent and responsible government is support of the management of institutions and readiness of the civil servants that work on the generation of data.
CPI Foundation and the Association of Citizens Why Not presented the results of their work with local and cantonal authorities and citizens in Tuzla Canton. Development of the platform Center 72 performed by the CPI Foundation enables the citizens to influence the local authorities, in a way to be able to report irregularities and to fight for better local government. On the other hand, development of the platform Public debate conducted by the Association of Citizens Why Not enables the citizens, activists and MPs to jointly perform more inclusive debates on the legislation. Both platforms have been implemented thanks to the desired improvements expressed by the local authorities and the citizens as an essential segment of the decision-making process.

Results of the Open Data Readiness Assessment in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina presented by TI BiH indicated that the FBiH open data initiative, which will be worked on by TI BiH along with the institutions in the future, will require:
• Strengthening the role of FBiH institutions in the activities of the Open Government Partnership initiative, and their capacities in order to readily respond to the obligations imposed by the initiative.
• Strong political orientation and leadership of the entity governments in supporting the openness.
• A centralized unit, with expertise in regard to technical, legal and strategic implications of the open data, responsible for the implementation of the open data initiative and education regarding open data provided to the civil servants in various departments, agencies and ministries.
• Adoption of clear policies on the right to re-use the data owned by the government.
• Initiation of the initiative to engage the citizens and raise the awareness of publication and open data, as well as the possibilites of their re-use.

„Political will and support are key to establish more transparent and responsible government, but it is also fundamental to make individual institutions find their own interest and advantage in this, in regard to better administration work, higher efficiency, savings and consequently greater confidence of the citizens in the work of institutions and improved quality of services“, it was noted by Lejla Ibranovic, Acting Executive Director of TI BiH, during her presentation of the benefits of the open government initiative

Press rls – 19 4 2016 doc eng