Activity Type: Advocacy

A corruption-free Town Hall

The project included a roundtable discussion with employees of the Prague City Hall on the transparent decision-making and the problem of corruption. Before the 2002 local communal elections all the competing political parties and movements were approached and requested answers from their candidates to six questions concerning their personal position with respect to questions of transparency and corruption. The outcome is a report on this survey. The second phase of the project were the workshops in the V4 countries’ capitals entitled “Corruption-free Town Halls in the Visegrad Region”” aiming at experience sharing and comparison. The result of the first meeting that took place in 2003 in Prague was the formulation of specific plans and further elaboration of the cooperation.”

Creation of Anti-Corruption Program for Environmental Project Management Agency

In the end of 2007, TILS completed an analysis of the activity of Environmental Project Management Agency (EPMA) as well as the legal acts of the activity of the agency with regards to transparency and promotion of credibility. When conducting the analysis, information was collected from the employees of the agency on the basis of “focusing discussions” and questionnaire, internal legal acts on the activity of EPMA, information from EPMA‘s website www.apva.lt, data collected from EPMA “Rulebook Evaluation” that was implemented by National Development Institute in 2006 and data collected from EPMA activity audit that was conducted by National Audit Office. EPMA anti-corruption program “Open Doors“ that was based on previously collected data was prepared in 2008. The “Open Doors“ program determined most sensitive to corruption areas in the Agency, designed anti-corruption measures, furthermore, it contributed to the creation of motivation and ethics supervision system of EPMA employees.

Youth initiative against corruption in Sliven

The project aimed to change the attitude of young people towards corruption through initiation of anti-corruption course in high-schools in the Sliven region. For the purpose, the project developed a program for anti-corruption education that included group simulations, case resolution in areas such as mediation and lobbying, money laundering, conflict of interests etc. Some of the project outputs included: 1. a sociological survey; 2. a round table with municipal representatives, lawyers, non-profit youth organizations, the civil association Public Barometer and students from the four surveyed schools; 3. development of a three-module training program; 4. a press conference.

Civil Movement

This project is run by a single woman who started to collect signatures in order to have a referendum on a range of corruption related issues: 1. no politician could receive reimbursment of additional costs without presenting the corresponding invoices, 2. no state aid is to be given to political parties, 3. the possibility of cancelling the mandate of elected MPs during their term.

“Public control over entrance campaign-2008: all-Ukraine project” and “Entrance Campaign-2009 – By Community’s Eyes”

The goal of the project was forming a coalition of NGOs and public monitoring of the admission campaigns 2008 and 2009 in 30 universities in 14 regions of Ukraine. Additionally, it foresaw the establishment of an anti-corruption information service.

Engage and Monitor for Change

Goals

EPF’s Engage and Monitor for Change program fosters the active and informed participation of Georgian community groups, CSOs and media outlets in the political and economic decision-making in their regions by building capacity among civic groups, encouraging monitoring and evaluation of policy reforms and facilitating public discussions, debates and network building. EPF also provides targeted small grants to unite less experienced organizations with more developed CSOs in project development and implementation and conducts grant competitions in civic monitoring of various sectors.

Impact

The concept of participatory civic monitoring emphasizes the process by which primary stakeholders at the local level actively engage in monitoring the government’s commitments to the reform process and public service delivery and become engaged in identifying or taking corrective actions. Through this process, EPF builds the capacity of local people to analyze information and catalyze commitment at the local level. Since the program’s inception in 2007, EPF has awarded over $480,000 to thirty four local civil organizations to engage in civic monitoring and capacity building through the targeted grant competitions. EPF will award more grants in 2013 to foster community engagement through the two more targeted grant competitions.

Source: Eurasia Partnership Foundation. Read more about this project here.

Corruption-Free Estonia

The aim of the project was to present the ways of restraining corruption in Estonian Radio (Vikerraadio). Eight broadcasts about corruption were leaded by Mr Tarmu Tammerk (director of by the Estonian Newspaper Association). The representatives of public institutions and nonprofit associations were invited quests of the broadcast to introduce their experiences of restraing corruption.

Coalition “Transparent Foreign Aid to Georgia” (in-house project)

The project intended to support the forming of a Coalition of 7 NGOs focused on rising and improving monitoring, transparency and accountability. The goal of the TFAG Coalition is to analyze, evaluate and monitor projects funded within the foreign aid package allotted to Georgia after the August 2008 armed conflict; to provide wide coverage of monitoring reports and to advocate for the elaborated recommendations.

Coalition for a Clean Parliament – European Parliament Election 2007

Concept: fighting large-scale corruption by preventing the lack of information about the candidates for Members of Parliament; agreeing on criteria that make a candidate unfit for a clean Parliament with the leaders of the political parties; developing black-lists of the parties’ candidates in order to cleanse the candidate lists; making these lists public (website, flyers, press).
In the autumn of 2006 10 organizations decided to form the Coalition for a Clean Parliament – European elections. At the beginning of the year the formation of the coalition and the criteria used in the monitoring of the candidates were announced. The Coalition contacted all major political parties and negotiated the access to the preliminary list of candidates before the official announcement. The Coalition organized the network of journalists that collected and assembled the data. The preliminary findings have been discussed with all parties. Given the changes of the electoral system and the evolutions of the political scene in recent years, the organizations forming the Coalition for Clean Parliament have decided to resume the monitoring of the political representatives using a new methodology. Therefore, the coalition deemed that it was not sufficient for a candidate to merely meet a set of integrity requirements, but that dignitaries should also seek to serve public interest and respect the rule of law. Before the parliamentary elections of 2008, the Coalition designed a set of instruments that were better suited to capture this perspective:
– a Pact for the Rule of Law – politicians were presented with a document with several key points they should commit to respect during office;
– monitoring political migration, defined as changing formal party allegiance (more than twice);
– monitoring of the manner in which those in office between 2004 and 2008 had voted on a series of issues and laws considered by the Coalition as particularly important for the rule of law.
The results of these monitoring activities were published on the “Clean Romania” website, which was thus transformed into a resource site for anticorruption advocacy.

Media Campaign: Accountability and Transparency in Bosnia&Herzegovina

Among the goals of the project:
– Promotion of good governance (promotion of transparency and accountability of governments and their role to serve the citizens);
– Increasement of public awareness of the problem of corruption (pointing out the proportion of the problem and its negative influence on society and living standards);
– Encouragement and promotion of intolerance for corruption (promotion of intolerance towards corruption and presentation of corruption as global a problem that society needs to solve if it wants to develop);
– Promotion of anti-corruption measures (encouragement of different initiatives, which could influence a decrease in corruption);
Introduction of anti-corruption mechanism to the citizens (introduce to the citizens the ways of reporting corruption);
– Encouragement of active civic participation in the fight against corruption (including NGOs, citizens and other organisations in activities of fighting the corruption);
– Raising citizens’ awareness about the existence and possibilities that Conflict of Interrest and Freedom of Information laws offer;
– Dissemination of information about corruption to the public and other institutions (NGOs, international organisations and government agencies).

Act on Free Access to Information

A law on free access to information that is a powerful tool for corruption control and watchdog activities has been absent in the Czech legal framework for quite a long time; this project contributed to the successful culmination of the efforts to bring it into life. The seminar was widely inclusive, convening the representatives of the civil society, deputies, journalists and civil servants. The printed outcome of the seminar was distributed to the members of Chamber of Deputies before the vote. The advocacy part and media campaign implemented by TIC targeted three main groups – deputies and senators, journalist and young people. The message was simple – allow for free access to information. Tools like free postcards with a motto “Get informed by your deputy or senator when they allow you to access the information” were used. TIC issued around 10.000 postcards and sent them to all legislators and important journalists; the postcards were also distributed freely by a chain of cinemas, cafes and restaurants. The main message of the campaign was modified and extended for each of the target groups (via press releases, letters or info brochures). The campaign managed to get the deputies and senators under pressure and made some of them to make a public commitment to support the law (43 out of the 200 deputies made the public commitment they would vote for the law). An individual approach to each and every deputy and senator proved efficient; it allowed for expression of their personal opinions and for media coverage. There was also an important role of journalist who were not only transmitting the message but took active part in the campaign. TIC supplied media actively with additional info on how the law works in different European countries or delivered the statements of the involved Czech deputies. The law was adopted in spring 1999 and went into effect as of January 2000.

Open doors for the citizens of Razgrad

The project’s main goal was the establishment of civic control over local self-government through the institutionalization of a civic defender (ombudsman) in the municipal administration of Razgrad. Some of its main activities included: 1. information board for corruption signals in the office building of the Municipality; 2. realization of a public forum “Civic Defense and Mediation Through the Local Ombudsman Institution””; 3. dissemination of materials / reports of the ombudsman and press conferences.”

Civic pressure on corruption and incompetence at local and state administration levels regarding illegal construction

The project was designed to fight against corruption in the municipal and state administration in the sphere of illegal construction. for the purpose an expert group monitoring the process of issuing construction licenses in the municipalities of Sofia was established during the actual project implementation. The project activities included: 1. analytical report on corrupt practices in cases of illegal building in Sofia Municipalities based on one-year survey; 2. development and dissemination of a brochure: “What Should We Know in Case of Illegal Building and Reconstruction””; 3. setting up of a citizens “”Complaints and Information Desk”” for legal assistance and lodgment of signals; 4. research and publicity on the municipal-level process of issuing construction licenses; 5. active public and media campaign to educate citizens about their rights in cases of illegal construction and to present the made disclosures of corruption in this field.”

Forum for ethical business promotion

The Foundation for Promotion of Entrepreneurship (Fundacja Rozwoju Przedsiębiorczości) had a general objective of raising the social awareness about corruption and its social and legal consequences and at the same time the project was to promote ethical behavior. Additionally, mapping out corruption risks in the Łódzkie province constituted another main goal.

Coalition for Clean Universities

The CCU project was created as an exercise of watchdog and benchmarking, meant to give a complete image of the academic integrity in Romania.

The project developed an integrity ranking for Romanian state universities by applying an already tested methodology was used in a pilot phase of the same project (October 2007-May 2008, funded by a MATRA-KAP Grant of the Embassy of Netherlands in Bucharest).

External evaluators were selected for monitoring the integrity and transparency of the universities. The project started by mapping out the problems of integrity that exist in the Romanian higher education system, and classified them by categories.

  • the administrative transparency and probity – the publication of accounting documents; publishing income declarations and declarations of interests and those reflecting the status of not being involved in the communist political police; access to public records on acquisitions;
  • academic fairness – plagiarism, performance in research, academic unfolding process;
  • quality of governance – nepotism, involvement of students in decision making, usage of financial grants, filling teaching positions;
  • financial management – discretionary expenditure, managing public acquisitions processes.
  • 42 state universities were evaluated, out of a total of 56, during 3 months. At the end of this programme, the Coalition published the Integrity ranking of Romanian Universities.

The project received the support of the main stakeholders: The Ministry of Education, Research and Youth, Students’ Organisations (ANOSR), Trade Union (Alma Mater), The National Agency for Quality Evaluation in Higher Education (ARACIS), educational NGOs.
The Coalition for Clean Universities is composed of the following:

  • Centre for Independent Journalism (CJI),
  • Pro Democracy Association (APD),
  • Euroregional Centre for Democracy (CED),
  • National Association of Students Organizations from Romania (ANOSR),
  • The Group for Reform in Universities (GRU)
  • Group for Social Dialogue (GDS)
  • Romanian Academic Society (SAR)
  • University Solidarity Association (SU)
  • EduCer Association (EduCer)
  • Ad-Astra Association (Ad Astra)
  • Romanian Society of Political Science (SRSP)
  • FAR Association (FAR)
  • New Europe College Foundation (NEC)

National Integrity System

The project sought to:
– Undertake a survey regarding the basic state pillars and bring recommendations how to reduce corruption in this institutions;
– Publish the survey in National Integrity System Study in English language;
– Promote results of National Integrity System Study through mass media;
– Stimulate broader public discussion on anti-corruption issues;
– Strength the rule of the law;
– Improve accountability and transparency of the public sector.
Activites of the project included:
– Investigation of the corruption phenomenon on the ground i.e. in 11 basic state pillars (Government, Parliament, Judiciary, Prosecutors, Police,);
– Printing of the National Integrity System Study;
– Media presentation;
– Distribution of the Study.

Arms Trade Control

The project focused on establishing regular contact and communication with relevant Czech parliamentarians and other relevant parties and on monitoring and analysing the existing legislation and documents. It also helped increase the information value of regular publication of detailed reports on arms and military material exports from the Czech Republic.

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