The Public Administration Reform Coordinator’s Office, in cooperation with its long-term partner – SIGMA and the new “EU for PAR” technical support project, organized a workshop in Sarajevo today for PAR coordinators and members and deputies of supervisory teams in order to collect data for prioritization and revision of the Action plan Strategic framework for public administration reform 2018 – 2022 (2027).
“Prioritization and revision of the Action plan is a requirement that is set before us on the way to the European Union. At the 6th meeting of the PAR Special Group, Bosnia and Herzegovina was tasked with revising the Action plan until the end of 2023. We are just starting this work,” said Dragan Ćuzulan, PAR coordinator of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“If we want to show readiness for membership and the ability to carry out what all the countries of the Union are doing, then we must show that the public administration of this country is capable of preparing a revised action document in a short period of time,” Ćuzulan warned.
During 2022, the Council of Ministers of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Governments of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Republika Srpska and Brčko District of Bosnia and Herzegovina extended the period of validity of the Strategic framework for public administration reform in Bosnia and Herzegovina 2018-2022 and the accompanying Action plan for five years, i.e. until the end of 2027.
Ćuzulan added that “the revision of the Action plan is not only necessary for the sake of European Integration, but also for our own sake – for the sake of the citizens to whom we have been promising for years to build a human-sized administration”. He emphasized that “the queues in front of the counters have not disappeared, civil society continues to warn about the politicization of the administration, and Bosnia and Herzegovina is falling lower and lower on the scale of countries affected by corruption.”
Enver Išerić, coordinator for public administration reform of the Government of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, emphasized that it will be necessary to pay more attention in the coming period to measures related to the digitization of public administration in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Mikan Davidović, deputy coordinator for public administration reform of the Government of the Republika Srpska, informed the audience that last week the Government of RS made a decision to appoint members of supervisory teams from this entity, which opens the possibility for more efficient work of the coordination structure in public administration reform. The decision on the appointment of members of the supervisory teams has not yet been made by the Council of Ministers of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The methodology for prioritization was presented at the workshop, and the key steps for the revision of the Action plan, responsibilities, outcomes and time frame were agreed upon.