Brussels, 25/06/2012 (Agence Europe) - Corruption is best tackled at a local level. The CIVEX commission (Commission for Citizenship, Governance, Institutional and External Affairs) and the Committee of the Regions held a two-day seminar on the subject on 21-22 June. The meeting helped facilitate the exchange of different good practices between member states, including Croatia, which hosted the event.
Local democracies are essential for ensuring transparency in the public sector and getting rid of corruption. The chair of the CIVEX commission, Luc Van den Brande, explained: “Local and regional authorities are particularly vulnerable: corruption - or in any case perception of it -exists within sectors of activity that lie within the competences of cities and regions, such as health and safety inspections, building permits and award of public contracts.” Without ignoring the added value of action taken to tackle corruption at national and international levels, Van den Brande pointed out that “the most successful means of dealing with this problem are the ones which are closest to the citizens and to which they have direct access.”
This is the first time that a CoR body has organised a meeting in Croatia. It demonstrates the determination of the CoR to work in close collaboration with the local authorities in the country, in view of its forthcoming accession to the EU, next year. Paul Vandoren, head of the European delegation to Croatia, said that corruption was an area in which action had to be stepped up in Croatia, as well as the restructuring of the shipyards and consolidating the rule of law. (MD/transl.fl)