The Chairperson, Deputy Chairperson and member of the GOPAC Serbia National Branch, Olgica Batic, Vladimir Pavicevic and Dubravka Filipovski, conveyed their experiences of the establishment of the GOPAC Serbia National Branch to the delegation of the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina, presented the work of the national branch in the previous period and offered assistance in the establishment of the GOPAC branch in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

GOPAC Serbia Chairperson Olgica Batic reminded everybody that the Charter founding the GOPAC Serbia National Branch was signed in 2013, with the goal of ensuring the parliamentarians’ active participation in the fight against corruption. She added that GOPAC reached one of its objectives this year – the launching of the Public Finance Supervision Portal, in cooperation with the Committee on Finance, State Budget and Control of Public Spending and the support of UNDP. Batic stressed that, though the National Assembly does not have a standing working body responsible for combating corruption, GOPAC Serbia has in the previous period actively cooperated with all the relevant factors dealing with the problem, from the competent committees of the National Assembly, to the State Audit Institution and the Anti-Corruption Agency. As very important, Batic emphasised the cooperation between GOPAC and the non-governmental and civil sector. She announced the adoption of a new annual activity plan which envisages increasing the media presence of the branch. One of the objectives of GOPAC Serbia is to involve as many parliamentarians as possible in its work, include former MPs, and sanction those members who fail to attend the meetings. In the Balkan region, only Serbia and Albania have national branches, added Batic, hoping that the other countries will follow their example.

GOPAC Serbia Deputy Chairperson Vladimir Pavicevic said that this meeting is an excellent opportunity to develop good-neighbourly relations over a common topic. He reminded everybody that the members of GOPAC belong to all the parliamentary groups at the National Assembly, that is in GOPAC the ruling majority and the opposition are united around a common goal – the fight against corruption. Another goal of the GOPAC Serbia National Branch is to establish a strong regional branch of the organisation, concluded Pavicevic.

GOPAC Serbia member Dubravka Filipovski spoke about the realised plans and objectives. She commended the intention of the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina to set up their own branch and offered to share the experiences of the Serbian branch with the colleagues from Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The delegation of the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina, comprising Bojan Ninkovic, Secretary of the House of Peoples of the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Jovica Katic, Secretary of the Committee for the election and monitoring of the Agency for the Prevention of Corruption and Coordination of the Fight against Corruption, stressed that Serbia’s experience of GOPAC is very important for Bosnia and Herzegovina and informed the members of GOPAC Serbia of what has so far been done toward the establishment of a branch in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The invitations have been sent to the parliamentary groups asking them to delegate representatives of the GOPAC branch and work has been done on the text of the Charter that would be presented and submitted for ruling in order to formally establish the branch. The Secretary of the House of Peoples of the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina Bojan Ninkovic said that regional cooperation in the fight against corruption is of great importance, adding that he hoped the other countries in the region would follow this route.

The members of the GOPAC Serbia National Branch and the delegation of the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina thanked the representatives of UNDP for the support the organisation provides the parliaments of Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.