USAID and SIDA Start a Project for Promotion of Administrative Responsibility

NINA

10 November 2004

The US Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Swedish Agency for International Development and Cooperation (SIDA) presented their Project for Promotion of Administrative Responsibility in Sarajevo.

The total worth of the project is estimated at 20 million US Dollars. The project will last for three years, and its main objective is to strengthen the work of the local governments in at least 40 municipalities, through construction of contact points for the municipal bodies and institutions which should make it possible to solve all requests and procedures through one desk. This should render the municipal governments more efficient and more open to public scrutiny.

�This is about the improvement of local governments both on state and entity level, development of their funds and securing capital loans. Currently, we are in the process of selection of the 40 municipalities, and the project will first start in 20 of them. We plan to establish four regional offices, in Sarajevo, Mostar, Tuzla and Banja Luka, with each region providing the initial five, and later ten municipalities to participate in the Project�, says Bob Sanders, Director of GAP.

The GAP will operate on state and entity levels, and will focus on advisory work for issues related to the structuring of the government in order to make it more efficient and responsible, and how to build the capacity of municipal associations with simultaneous preservation of the dynamics of the existing municipal governments.