Center for Civil Communications

The project develops mechanisms for increasing the transparency, accountability, and responsibility of the local governments in Macedonia, encouraging greater participation of the citizens and the local business community in the decision-making process in the local governments and exchange of best practices and experiences among the municipalities in the country as well as the region. The project aims toward decreasing the level of corruption in the local communities and strengthening the trust of the citizens and the business representatives in the local governments. It is conducted in partnership with the nongovernmental organizations EHO and NVO Infocentre and is financially supported by USAID Macedonia.

The project has started with a comprehensive research of the current practices of the municipalities from Eastern Macedonia in order to obtain relevant data about the satisfaction of the citizens, their associations and the business community with the services provided by the municipality, and their participation in the decision-making process of the municipalities, as well as to detect weaknesses in the municipalities, in the direction of transparent, efficient, and accountable working.

The results served as basis for providing local administration with training on enhancing their work especially in detected weak areas. In the same time, in all four municipalities Centers for citizen’s satisfaction have been opened to serve as focal points for permanent collection of citizens, businesspeople and civil society representatives’ complaints, ideas, and suggestions for improving the work of the local administration. The collected material is been structured and regularly sent to the administrations, and their actions upon it have been constantly monitored.