Background and Objectives
The Kotor municipality has formed a Working Group, consisting of representatives of the local
administration, NGOs and media. Through a series of surveys, separately done by media,
NGO’s and the municipal administration, the Working Group has confirmed a strong perception
of corruption among the citizens, especially in regard to municipal services delivery and the
transparency of work of the local administration. It has also established that there is a poor level
of understanding of corruption problems among public servants and well as the population at
large. A majority of citizens would like to see more information on municipality activities, the
establishment of stricter control mechanisms and raising NGO capacities and involvement in
anti-corruption activities. The results of these surveys served as the basis for formulating a
municipal anti-corruption strategy (MACS), which focuses on measures such as building
capacities of civil servants and local counselors, increasing transparency of the municipal
administration and procedures as well as developing concrete monitoring and evaluation
mechanisms, which would be tested during the MACS implementation and sustained beyond
the MACS. However, municipal efforts to curb corruption, enhance municipal service delivery
and increase transparency are impeded by the lack of models and concrete guidelines on how
to implement MACS in practice as well as limited local government and local NGO capacities.
With support from PTF CDT has designed a project to improve service delivery and
transparency in the municipality of Kotor. This project is based on best practice and technical
advise from the municipality of Rijeka, Croatia. The project also assists the municipality of Kotor
to develop, implement and monitor its broader municipal anti-corruption strategy (MACS).
Project Outcomes
The project has improved transparency and access to information and opened channels for
citizens to ask questions and register complaints. Specifically:
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The municipality is now giving its citizens timely information via the web on: a) on the
activities and decisions of municipal assembly and administrative bodies, b) budgets and
actual outcomes. The Kotor municipality became the first among 21 of Montenegrin
municipalities to publish “Easy-to-Understand Budget” reports, which provide a simple
overview of financial operations of the municipal administration c) public procurement
contracts d) asset declarations of municipal officials.
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Mechanisms for submission of citizens’ inquiries and complaints are now in place and
are increasingly used. An official has been appointed to receive and respond to citizen’s
inquiries.
The project and CDT have trained selected Kotor municipal staff in becoming aware of
and dealing with transparency challenges notably handling corruption reports filed by
citizens. The training also covers IT skills necessary to maintain user-friendly web
transparency.
Recognizing that “voice does not automatically lead to accountability” CDT and the
Kotor have agreed to supplement existing civic oversight with monitoring and evaluation
mechanisms, which will serve as the basis for an assessment of further impact and
quality of implementation of newly adopted measures. PTF will be granted access to the
results of this monitoring.
An important lesson from this project which is applicable to many PTF funded projects is the
way political and bureaucratic resistance was overcome. Such resistance has plagued many
PTF funded municipal reform projects. By targeting “enlightened” municipalities NGOs can
engage in constructive cooperation and win the confidence of municipal politicians and
administration and thereby help transfer knowledge and best practices which will lead to more
transparency. At best municipal politicians and administrators will realize that transparency and
responsiveness to the citizens would not harm their interests and provide “ammunition” for
public criticism, but on the contrary - increase the confidence of citizens and the legitimacy of
politicians and administrators. Model municipalities would “shame” less transparent
neighbors into becoming more transparent. This is CDT’s formula for improving
transparency at the municipal level in Montenegro and significant progress has already
been made.