Moldova got a score of 58 out of 100 and was placed 33rd among 115 states in the Open Budget Index in which it was included first in 2017, IPN reports.
The central government transparency rankings are compiled by the international NGO Budget Partnership, while at the national level by the independent think tank “Expert-Grup”. “Expert-Grup” programs director Dumitru Budianschi said the Open Budget Survey covered the budget documents for 2015, 2016 and the draft budget for 2017.
Moldova’s budget transparency score is by 16 points higher than the global average of 42 points. This result shows that the country offers limited budget information, as does Slovakia and Poland (59), outstripping yet Ukraine (54) and Hungary (46), but being surpassed by Romania (75 out of 100).
As regards the oversight of the budget process by the Court of Auditors and Parliament, Moldova got a score of 59 out of 100, similar to such countries of the region as Turkey, Bulgaria and Croatia, but much lower than the neighboring country Ukraine, which scored 83 points.
As to the citizens’ participation in the budget process, the Republic of Moldova obtained a score of 7 out of 100, which shows that the Government didn’t manage to involve the people in the process of drafting the budget.
Minister of Finance Octavian Armasu expressed his conviction that Moldova will have a better position in the next rankings. According to him, the budget process during the previous years was seriously affected by the political and financial crises. The state budgets were approved with delay, but considerable efforts were made in 2017 to approve the 2018 budget on time. Work will be done to improve the quality of information, to involve the people more and to approve the budget documents on time.
Attending the conference, Marco Gemmer, Deputy Head of Operations Section at the EU Delegation to Moldova, said the survey results are not a surprise as a part of them served as a condition for providing EU assistance. These results point to the necessity of more specific recommendations, such as improvement of the quality of budget information, improvement of the budget oversight by the Court of Auditors and Parliament and of public participation in the budget process. The processes for improving the management of public finances should continue, while the European partners and representatives of NGOs are ready to provide support in this regard. The results of the survey also enable to identify the activities on which emphasis should be placed to get a better score the next time.
The Open Budget Index is compiled once in two years. At regional level, Romania moved up to the top ten, while at world level, Georgia, Jordan, Mexico and Senegal made the most significant progress owing to the efforts of the government, civil society and the active and committed mass media.
