News

Chisinau hosted the conference for assessing the media campaign “Call to account for public money!” unfolded during the year 2010. The event was attended by journalists, representatives of local public administrations, Ministry of Finances, Public Procurement Agency, Court of Accounts, experts in public procurement.

Throughout the year 2010, this campaign monitored the correctness and efficiency of public procurements unfolded by authorities from eight towns of the country (Ungheni, Cimişlia, Soroca, Rezina, Orhei, Bălţi, Chişinău, Criuleni). The monitoring results were mirrored in articles published in the column „Call to account for public money!” in six local and regional newspapers („Unghiul”, „Gazeta de Sud”, „Observatorul de Nord”, „Cuvântul”, „SP”, „Est Curier”) and in the national weekly „Ziarul de Gardă”.

Petru Macovei, API Executive Director, declared that, during the campaign, the journalists followed all the public procurement development stages, identifying more gaps which diminish the efficiency of the process, including the reduced transparency of procurement procedures, overall assessment of planned public procurement, insufficient supervision of public procurement contracts' execution etc. In some cases, the journalists ran into the non-desire to collaborate on behalf of local authorities, which made the checking of public procurement correctness more difficult and hindered the constant information of readers about the expense of public money through procurement.

The public officials and journalists attending the conference have noticed the flaws in the legislation on public procurement, coming up with suggestions to improve the legal framework regulating this field. To his turn, Mr. Ştefan Creangă, General Director of Public Procurement Agency, declared the legislation should be improved, but the biggest problems are its implementation and the attempts to avoid certain transparent procurement procedures. Preliminary data of the Public Procurement Agency show that in the year 2010 over 1 billion MDL of public money was spent for procurement of goods and services outside public bids, through other procedures foreseen by the law, such as call for bids.

Also during the conference, the Guidelines „Public procurement and citizens' involvement in checking the efficiency of public money expenditure” was introduced, depicting benchmarks for monitoring public procurement, which are to be followed by civil society organizations and mass-media while initiating the checking of public money expenditure.

The campaign „Call to account for public money!” shall be prolonged for another year (2011), aiming at involving groups of journalists, citizens and representatives of non-governmental organizations in the checking of public money use in Chisinau and Baltsi municipalities.

The campaign „Call to account for public money!” is implemented by the Association of Independent Press (API) with the financial assistance of Soros-Moldova Foundation.

source: www.api.md