Agency for Prevention of Corruption

Press release

Aug. 21, 2020

In order to ensure the full transparency of the election process, the Agency for Prevention of Corruption published on its website the documents submitted to it during the campaign by the entities subject to the law, that is, the authorities, political entities and the media. Through full transparency, the Agency contributes to further strengthening of the integrity of the election process and public confidence in the work of this authority.

The Agency performs essential control of financing of the election campaign and this authority consistently, without exception and transparently carries out all legally prescribed competencies, and in the case of suspicions of violations of the law, initiates ex officio procedures and acts on all received complaints.

Throughout the campaign so far, the Agency has initiated 288 procedures relating to the use of public resources in the election campaign, after having controlled 18,000 submitted documents of the authorities that contain analytical cards on social welfare benefits and budget spending, travel orders, etc. Following the control of the documentation, it issued 604 warnings to the entities subject to the law, and 48 opinions upon the requests of the authorities, as well as 544 pieces of legal advice and clarifications.

Out of 288 procedures, the most (123) were initiated for the control of restrictions on monthly consumption, followed by the control of employment (101). The Agency performed 10 field controls of the authorities and published all the records from these field controls on its website. The records are published after all performed controls and after the completion of initiated procedures.

As regards political entities, the control of 10 political entities is underway, that is, of the documentation on all their activities during the election campaign. The control of all 706 contributors to political entities is also underway. Based on the submitted invoices and contracts, as well as the performed controls, 118 activities of political entities were recorded, that is, the costs in the amount of almost 700,000 euros.

Moreover, the Agency published all price lists of media advertising received within the legal deadline, as well as those that were received after the legal deadline, so that the interested public, and above all political entities, would have a complete insight into that documentation. The Agency monitors and initiates misdemeanour procedures against the entities subject to the law for which it determines that they provided media advertising services to political entities, but did not submit the price list to this authority within the deadline or did not submit it at all.

The Agency acted on all 107 complaints submitted to it during the campaign because of suspicions of violations of the Law, and it issued first instance decisions in the shortest possible time in all cases where the conditions were met. So far, 49 first instance decisions have been issued, and in other cases the procedures are ongoing.

Through full transparency of its work and the publishing of the received documentation on its website, the Agency has enabled the interested public to have an insight into the documents submitted to this authority, which refer to the financing of the election campaign and the use of public resources. The data about this which are publicly published through the media, are, for most part, precisely the data that the Agency has made public.

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