KDI: Lack of Transparency for Social Policy in Prizren region

The Kosovo Democratic Institute (KDI) has published research analysis “Social Policy at the local level”, including Prizren, Rahoveci and Dragas municipality, where the impasse in drafting annual plans and maintaining social and family services in these municipalities is highlighted.

Naim Cahan from KDI, at a media conference, said that despite the legal obligations of municipalities in drafting annual plans in maintaining social and family services, none of the municipalities involved within this research have such documents.

“Such a thing has reflected in the lack of transparency and accountability of municipalities in the involvement of citizens in the drafting and implementation of social policies”, he said.

Kahan argued the lack of respect for procedures and lack of clear criteria for providing local-level subsidies, while KDI's Elmedina Dorambar has spoken about the funding policies of Civil Society Organisations offering certain social services.

During research, lack of criteria and uniformity has been noted, not specifying in detail which criteria should be met with the aim of access to subsidies from Civil Society Organisations. Lack of domestic politics could reflect on the lack of transparency and exclusion of many organisations offering social services on the territory of relevant municipalities”, Dorambar has said. This research, it produces Prizren municipality as the only municipality, which, under its social policies, has invested in funding particular residential programmes, but the Prizren municipality, should create a multilateral mechanism in monitoring the implementation of contracts with current beneficiaries.

Dorambar also presented recommendations derived from this research for these municipalities as a change of municipal regulations for the division of Prizren and Dragas subsidies, implementation and respect of municipal regulation for the separation of subsidies from the municipality of Rahovec.

Also among the recommendations is the inclusion of community and Civil Society Organisations in the drafting of the annual social services plan, increased transparency and publication of the annual plan on the municipality's website, the design of local strategic plans for addressing social and family needs in long term.

KDI recommends increasing the municipal budget for capital investments for social residential policies at the local level of Dragas and Rahovec, establishing standards and respecting criteria in social residential policy programmes from the Prizren municipality.

Also, the establishment of a multi-party commission on monitoring the implementation of contracts with current social residential users in the Prizren municipality and increasing oversight and co-operation between MPMS and municipalities in drafting strategic plans for social residences and separation of social settlements from the municipality are among the KDI recommendations.