CIVILISC Project – Sharing good governance practices in Albania and Bulgaria

Tirana, September 14, 2018 – Over the past 3 years,  IDM in partnership with RiskMonitor Foundation (Bulgaria) has implemented the project CIVILISC – Civil society Instruments against Corruption, funded by the EU Delegation to Albania aiming to improve the capacities and role of civil society at promoting good governance and the fight against corruption at local level. The fight against corruption remains one of Albania’s main challenges and a key condition in its path towards the EU integration- leading to the adoption of substantial reforms aiming to build democratic and efficient institutions. On the other side, civil society and non-state actors must ensure presence in the implementation of anti-corruption mechanisms as well as initiate progressing actions that will contribute at improving local governance’s efficiency, transparency, accountability, quality public services, and citizen participation. In this “transforming” context, the CIVILISC project has contributed at boosting civil society competencies to play a crucial role at improving good-governance.

Experience gained from CIVILISC showed that good-governance shortcomings are more evident at local level due to lack of capacities of both state and non-state actors to deal with this issue, low level of public trust in governance and lack of comprehensive approach in the decision-making process. Under this background, the CIVILISC project has achieved remarkable results when it comes to building genuine civil society engagement in 12 small municipalities in Albania. Additionally, it has improved capacities of both civil society organizations and local administration to deal with the fight against corruption as well as developing important resource materials contributing to the future development of the sector.

At the end of this project, on September 14 2018, both implementing organizations organized the final conference which served as a meeting place among state and non-state stakeholders from Albania and Bulgaria- which shared their extensive expertise in the fight against corruption in Bulgaria related to prevention and counteraction of corruption at local level as well as joint efforts that both local governments and civil society actors should undertake at improving good-governance at local level.

This final event was welcomed by IDM’s Executive Director, Mr. Sotiraq Hroni, Dr. Stephen Stork- Head of Section for Rule of Law and Good Governance, the deputy minister of Justice, Mrs. Teuta Vodo and Mrs. Pavlina Filipova from RiskMonitor Foundation. On his speech, Mr. Stork emphasized the impact of CIVILISC and the IDM’s contribution at involving different stakeholders in good-governance at local level, as a response also to the EU efforts in assisting Albania at the fight against corruption. Additionally, Mrs. Vodo appreciated the work of the civil society at the fight against corruption which is in line also with the Albania’s National Anti-corruption Action Plan as well as encouraged CSOs to cooperate with government institutions in the monitoring process of this action plan.

In addition, participants in the event had the opportunity to share experiences, best practices among Bulgarian and Albanian panelists focused on challenges and future development of local government units to deal with the fight against corruption; the multi-stakeholder approach in the local decision making and Youth mobilization- Connecting Agents of Change at local level.

Take closer look at CIVILISC results: CIVILISC In a Nutshell   and the brochure on CSOs best practices in the fight against corruption in the local level.

*Feel free to contact us: [email protected] for the PDF version of this brochure.