Today, USAID has launched the campaign in the framework of the anti-corruption week with the slogan “Demand accountability for your money”, which aims at the integrity of the municipalities of Kosovo to promote accountability, integrity and transparency at all levels of government for the benefit of the citizens.
The Director of USAID Project on Kosovo Municipal Integrity, Maia Gogoladze, said that this activity will be a step forward against corruption. She said that the fight against corruption has many challenges, but in partnership with the central and municipal governments, the phenomenon of corruption will be fought.
Vlora Spanca from the National Audit Office (NAO), stated that the reports of corruption are large. According to her, about 300 cases of corruption in capital projects have been sent to the State Prosecutor’s Office from 2018 to 2022.
The head of the Board of the Public Procurement Regulatory Commission (PPRC), Osman Vishaj said that the main challenge of procurement remains improper planning, transparency and supervision of contracts.
Otherwise, the European Commission’s report on Kosovo has also paid attention to the fight that Kosovo has waged against corruption and organized crime, emphasizing that our country is in the middle of an early stage in the fight against these two phenomena.
According to the report, Kosovo is in the middle of an early stage and a level of preparation in the fight against corruption.
“Limited progress was made during the reporting period, and corruption remains an issue of concern. While last year the Assembly adopted significant anti-corruption legislation and the legal framework on criminal confiscation is advanced, a lot remains to be done to implement the anti-corruption legislation. Despite improvement in the performance of the Agency for Prevention of Corruption, the anti-corruption preventive tools laid down in the legislation are not yet fully used. Kosovo should step up efforts to have more proactive investigations, final court decisions and final confiscation of assets. Kosovo is at an early stage in the fight against organised crime. Limited progress was made on the investigation and prosecution of organised crime cases. Kosovo adopted a new police organisational structure and upgraded intelligence and analysis capacities. Law enforcement operations against organised crime continued. Despite this, the powerful tools envisaged by the Criminal Code and the Law on extended powers of confiscation are yet to be fully utilised. Fighting organised crime in the north of Kosovo continues to be challenging”, reads the report. /KosovaPress
