Who Informs the Citizens about the Work of the Municipalities?

10 October 2007

We are yet to meet a local government, or local official, for that matter, who will not respond, if asked, without a moment of hesitation, that the work of the said municipality is �transparent� and that informing the citizens is paramount. In real life, however, nothing is as clear and self-evident.

The Modern Skills Centre association conducted a survey, covering all municipalities in Serbia, on existence of municipal information offices. The results are quite clear: 76 municipalities (46%) has either an office or a person charged with the task to provide information to the citizens. On the other hand, 91 municipalities have neither.

�The information we collected � which are disappointing, to say the least � show that municipalities in Serbia are not interested for quality reporting to their citizens, or to create the proper offices and facilities in that regard. There is a general trend to charge it, on ad hoc basis to some employee or the other. Clearly, the biggest problem lies with the institutional positioning of these services in the municipal administration�, says the Centre.

Having in mind the collected data, it is easy to conclude that the municipal authorities have largely neglected the constitutional obligation to inform the public, and that nobody does it, in fact, in majority of cities and townships.

Under its efforts to promote the rights of the citizens ot public information, the Centre proposes that the new Law on Local Self-Government should instal the mandatory position of public relations manager in all municipalities.

The local administration bodies will have to be legally obligated to communicate with the public. The citizens have the right to know and evaluate the work of the local authorities. The awareness withing the administration has to grow. However, as in the other similar cases, it was proven that legal obligation has more than a favourable effect on that growth.