OSLOBOĐENJE: In the latest progress report of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the European Commission has, among the other things, concluded that the public administration reform is at an unsatisfactory level. Semiha Borovac, director of the Public Administration Reform Coordinator’s Office, agrees with such evaluation as well.

– BiH administration has not yet executed first reform objectives, which refer to the full implementation of the Public Administration Reform Strategy. Therefore, we must additionally  work on reducing a fragmentation and de-politicization of public service. Also, for the further continuation of the reform, required is a stronger political support, cooperation, corporate work and sharing common objectives of all of us who participate in this process, says Borovac.

The Public Administration Reform Coordinator’s Office has been formed in 2004., but in order for that process to take place, it was necessary for the governments at all levels to adopt the strategic documents, with reference to the Public Administration Reform Strategy and the Action Plan 1 for its implementation, which has been done in 2006, as well as list of other documents which have established the coordination mechanisms of the process itself.

– Here, it is about the reform of four administrations, not only one. The main role of the Coordinator’s Office is to coordinate the reform process in BiH between four levels of government, in order for the process to be performed in an equal and synchronized manner at all levels. The key objective refers to the professional administration in function of citizens as a part of the European Administration Area. The greatest progress until July of this year has been evidenced in the reform area of Institutional Communication (69.15 percent) and the lowest in the area of Information Technologies (38.97 percent).

Lack of cooperation

At the recent workshop held at Vlašić,  presented has been the document Guidelines for reporting and monitoring of measures from the new Revised Action Plan 1. The workshop, says Borovac, has represented an opportunity to talk about the problems in the public administration reform process.

– The institutions are the ones who execute the reform measures and report to the supervisory team members. The governments at all four levels in BiH, by adopting the Revised Action Plan 1, have obliged the institutions to include in their annual work plans the measures and activities from this document. We must find a way for better cooperation with these institutions, because the further reform implementation will depend on it, she has said.

The highest level of implementation of measures from the Action Plan 1 has been recorded in the Brčko District of BiH, 57.19 percent. If you ask me what those measures are, I will give an  example from the reform area of Administrative Procedure: Drafting of Administrative Decision Making in Bosnia and Herzegovina Quality Improvement Programme. The measure was common for all four administration levels. The Council of Ministers of BiH and the Government of the Republic of Srpska have already adopted this program, while the adoption by the Government of the Federation of BiH and the Brčko District of BiH is still waiting. Implementation of this program enables the improvement of  existing legal solutions, in terms of simplifying services for citizens and business subjects, which particularly refers to the electronic communication between citizens and administration, as well as an obligation of the administration to obtain the information led by official records, which has up to this time been done by citizens, explains Borovac.

The public administration reform should at the end bring many benefits for citizens, or result in the public administration based on the principles and standards of the EU.

– The documents we have talked about contain the activities whose implementation will reach this objective. Those principles are, first of all, saving time and efforts of our citizens in obtaining certain services provided by administration bodies, simplification of procedures, electronic communication between administration and citizens, free and charge-free access to databases, Borovac has said.