Macedonian State Commission for Prevention of Corruption: Can It Effectively Control and Prevent Corruption in the Public Administration?

Macedonian State Commission for Prevention of Corruption: Can It Effectively Control and Prevent Corruption in the Public Administration? Professor Ana PAVLOVSKA DANEVA1 Assistant Konstantin BITRAKOV2 Abstract This paper deals with the core preventive anti-corruption authority in the Republic of North Macedonia (hereinafter: Macedonia), which is the State Commission for Prevention of Corruption (hereinafter: SCPC). The main research question is: can and does the SCPC effectively control the public administration as per its legal competencies and does it therefore prevent corruption successfully? The final objective is to provide critical observations in terms of the SCPC’s functions, tasks, and powers, as well as its performance and the effects of its work, which would later allow for recommendations for improvement. In other words, the paper will indicate that a discrepancy exists. By law, the SCPC is the key authority for prevention of corruption in the public administration. In reality, the SCPC’s successes are rather humble – the administrative corruption has hardly been eliminated. The content of the paper reflects its object and the idea behind it. It shall pay attention to the existing research in terms of the prevalence of corruption in the Macedonian public administration (so that the national context is given), the role of the SCPC by law and its performances. Keywords: State Commission for Prevention of Corruption, corruption, public administration, anti-corruption authorities, Republic of North Macedonia, prevention. JEL Classification: H83, K14, K23 1. Introduction The Republic of North Macedonia (hereinafter: Macedonia) has been struggling with corruption within the public sector – and the public administration therein – for a rather long time. One can support this claim using multiple sources, for instance the Corruption Perception Index (hereinafter: CPI) as one of the most popular measurements, reports by non-governmental organizations (hereinafter: NGOs), the reports produced by the international community, etc. CPI ranks countries by their perceived levels of public sector corruption. 3 Each country earns between zero and 100 points, zero meaning that corruption is widespread and 100 points meaning that the country is very clean (in terms of corruption). Ever since 2012, Macedonia has been scoring between 35 and 44 points, meaning that corruption is fairly widespread (the rankings before 2012 are not taken into consideration since a different methodology for the CPI was used then). The rankings can be seen here: Year Score Ranking ‘12 43 69 ‘13 44 67 ‘14 45 64 ‘15 42 66 ‘16 37 90 ‘17 35 107 ‘18 37 93 ‘19 35 106 ‘20 35 111 ‘21 35 87 Multiple Macedonian NGOs have also taken efforts to measure the corruption perception. SELDI is a network of NGOs which issues Reports on corruption level assessment for a few years now. According to the 2014 SELDI Report,4 corruption was perceived by the citizens as the fifth key problem for Macedonia (preceded by high prices, low income, poverty and unemployment). The Ana Pavlovska Daneva - Faculty of Law “Iustinianus Primus”, Saints Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje, Republic of North Macedonia, . 2 Konstantin Bitrakov - Faculty of Law “Iustinianus Primus”, Saints Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje, Republic of North Macedonia, . 3 In terms of the methodology, the points are assigned crisscrossing data from various sources such as the World Bank, World Economic Forum, Freedom House, as well as private consulting houses. The methodology is explained on the webpage of Transparency International. The document is available online at https://www.transparency.org/en/news/how-cpi-scores-are-calculated (12.05.2023). 4 Emina Nuredinoska, Marija Sazdevski, Borjan Gjuzelov, Corruption Assessment Report for Macedonia, Macedonian Center for International Cooperation, Skopje, 2014, 17, the document is available online at https://seldi.net/fileadmin/public/PDF/Publications/ CAR_Macedonia/CAR_MacedoniaEnglish.pdf (12.05.2023). 1 Perspectives of Law and Public Administration Volume 12, Issue 3, October 2023 295 situation got even worse in 2021, at least according to SELDI. That year corruption was perceived as the first key problem for the country. 5 Even though SELDI measures corruption in general, not corruption in the public sector or the public administration, the research results are quite alarming. Speaking of the public administration corruption per se, an NGO called Center for Change Management conveyed a survey in 2017 and issued a Report where it was stated that 35,6% of the responds agreed with the statement that “corruption is widely spread within the state and public administration”.6 The country does not get much better scores in the World Bank estimates, the estimates of Freedom House, etc. At this moment we would refrain from burdening the text with too many analyses on the perceptions of corruption in the Macedonian public administration. The point is that all sources indicate that the Macedonian public sector, and the public administration as a part of it, is highly corrupt. Therefore, effective prevention of corruption in the public administration is vital.7 The key institutional actor when it comes to the prevention, per the current legislation, is the State Commission for Prevention of Corruption (hereinafter: SCPC). This brings us to the question – is the SCPC successful in performing its task? In fact, can the SCPC considering its institutional structure be successful? To reach a conclusion in this regard one needs to understand the functions of the SCPC and measures it can take in accordance with the legislation, as well as its performances within the last few years. Also, the national context is important. If the SCPC should control the public administration in terms of corruption, as well as undertake preventive measures, one has to know how the administration in Macedonia is structured. It is important to note that the SCPC exists as an institution since 2002, however it was significantly reformed at the beginning in 2019. Respectively, only the last few years are taken into consideration. 2. The State Commission for Prevention of Corruption as a preventive anti-corruption authority The State Commission for Prevention of Corruption can be classified as a preventive anticorruption authority. So, let us first elaborate what an anti-corruption authority is, and, furthermore, what a preventive anti-corruption authority is. De Sousa defines anti-corruption authorities as “public (funded) bodies of a durable nature, with a specific mission to fight corruption and reducing the opportunity structures propitious for its occurrence in society through preventive and/or repressive measures.”8 So, it becomes vivid that the anti-corruption authorities are public bodies which are specialized in fighting corruption as their main role and can either focus on preventive or repressive measures. Som (...truncated)