“Bosnia and Herzegovina is at an early stage and made limited progress in public administration reform. However, 4 years after adoption, implementation of the PAR action plan is lagging behind particularly on building a professional civil service capable of effectively delivering services to citizens and businesses”, European Commission’s Report stated.
European Commission states that civil service laws remain not harmonised with each other and merit principles not enshrined in all recruitment procedures, while the monitoring of human resources is not effective to detect irregularities.
Report further states that notably, positive steps were taken in the area of public finance management:
1. Comprehensive and countrywide public finance management (PFM) strategy was adopted, which now needs to be implemented
2. Each level of government started implementing PFM strategies
3. State institutions improved some professional trainings
4. Federation entity amended its administrative procedures.
“A political decision-making body to steer PAR still needs to be set up to effectively steer reforms. Therefore, last year’s recommendations remain largely valid. In line with Opinion key priority 14, Bosnia and Herzegovina needs to complete essential steps to improve the overall functioning of the public administration by ensuring a professional and depoliticised civil service and a coordinated countrywide approach to policy making”, it was assessed in the report.
In the coming year, Bosnia and Herzegovina should especially:
1. Implement the countrywide strategic framework for public financial management 2021-2025 at state level and extend the validity of the current PAR strategic framework to 2023-2027 at the state level and in the Federation entity, and finalise and adopt e-government strategies at the state level, and in the Federation entity and Brčko District
2. Establish a functioning coordination structure with a political decision-making body and improve the capacity of PAR coordinators to steer implementation of public administration reforms across all levels of government
3. Ensure a professional civil service system, by amending civil service laws in line with merit principles and establishing a performance-based monitoring for transparent human resource management at all levels of government to detect irregularities
4. Foster a user-oriented administration by developing a coherent policy framework on service delivery and related e-signature infrastructure at all government levels in order to simplify and modernise administrative procedures and digitise services for businesses and citizens.
Related documents:
New report of the European Commission for Bosnia and Herzegovina for the year 2022
Communication from the European Commission, the European Parliament, etc.