The public hearing was chaired by Committee member Nikola Radosavljevic, who stressed that the purpose of today's public hearing is to consider legal solutions and, in an argumentative dialogue, exchange opinions and listen to proposals and suggestions from all interested participants, with the aim of contributing to the adoption of a quality legal framework that will improve the transparency of financing political activities, strengthen citizens' trust in the electoral process and enable the consistent application of the highest standards of accountability and legality.

The Bill amending and modifying the Law on Financing Political Activities Held was presented by the submitter, MP Miroslav Petrasinovic, who pointed out that the Bill was the result of cooperation with the OSCE International Monitoring Mission, the ODIHR Office, in order to improve electoral conditions in Serbia. This Bill is just one of the laws implementing the ODIHR recommendations and was created in communication and coordination with them, said Petrasinovic. He added that this Bill addresses eight recommendations, which concerned several electoral processes in Serbia, and the text of the Bill was submitted to all relevant stakeholders in the country for their opinion.

Petrasinovic pointed out that the Bill includes the following recommendations: Recommendation 18 from 2020, which refers to the reduction of donations that natural and legal persons can make to political entities and the publication of financial reports on the conducted election campaign; Recommendation 20 from 2020, which enables better supervision by the Agency for the Prevention of Corruption, giving it greater powers than it previously had, and the novelty is the submission of bank statements that the Agency can review, as well as all accounting records that political entities have; Recommendation 21 from 2020, which refers to the graduated system of sanctions that the Agency imposes; then, Recommendation 6 from 2022, which is related to the campaign that can be carried out by third parties and this is now defined in more detail; Recommendation 16 from 2022, which refers to the limitation of election campaign costs and the prohibition of the misuse of public funds; Recommendation 17 from 2022, which relates to when the Agency initiates proceedings ex officio and upon reports, where there are now shorter deadlines for its action, but also for initiating a dispute before the Administrative Court; Recommendation 13 from 2023, which concerns equal rights to use public spaces and Recommendation 15 from 2023, which concerns the abolition of the guarantee for those entities that do not have MPs or councillors, so that they will now also have the right to public funds without the obligation to provide a guarantee.

After the introductory presentation, the proposer explained in detail the implementation of each recommendation into the legal text, and in the discussion that followed, the participants exchanged opinions and shared objections and suggestions to the proposed legal solution.

Concluding the public hearing, the Chair, Nikola Radosavljevic said that this Bill represents an important step forward in improving the electoral and political system in Serbia and that it will contribute to transparency, accountability and trust in the financing of political activities for the benefit of all citizens of Serbia.

In addition to members of the Committee and MPs who are not members of the Committee, the public hearing was attended by representatives of the Ministry of Finance, the Agency for the Prevention of Corruption, the Speaker and Deputy Speaker of the Nis City Assembly, representatives of the Nis City Administration, councillors of the Nis City Assembly, representatives of the civil sector, as well as other interested members of the public.

The public hearing was chaired by Committee member Nikola Radosavljevic, and was attended by the following Committee members and deputy members: Jasmina Palurovic and MA Svetlana Milijic, as well as MPs who are not members of the Committee: Vesna Stankovic, Natasa Mihajlovic, Miljana Milojevic, Haji Milorad Stosic and Miroslav Petrasinovic, who is also the submitter of the Bill amending and modifying the Law on Financing Political Activities.

The Committee will hold the next public hearings on the same topic on 2 and 3 July 2026 in Novi Sad and Belgrade respectively.