Parliament debates bill on public enterprises

BELGRADE The Serbian parliament on Monday in Belgrade started a debate on a set of financial bills, including that on public enterprises. Under the new proposed legislation, directors of such enterprises should be elected through open competitive job announcements. Parliament debates bill on public enterprises A fundamental change from the outgoing solution is the introduction of mandatory invitation for the public to compete for a position vacancy and director of requirements a person has to meet to apply for the position. One of the requirements is that a director to-be can not be a member of any political party or that their functions in political parties are frozen before and during their time with the enterprise. The job announcements are to be conducted by an independent expert commission, under a clear procedure that is fully controlled by the public. The bill provides for the abolition of management boards in public enterprises, with new management structures possible to be organized in two ways - by having a supervisory board and the director-general, or by having a supervisory board, an executive board, made up of the board chairman and executive directors, and the director-general of the enterprise. The main objective of the bill, according to the Serbian government, is to professionalize public enterprises and an increase in their efficiency and transparency of their work. Meanwhile, Program Director of Transparency Serbia Nemanja Nenadic told told Radio B92 that the proposed law was better than the present, but at the same time "far from expectations" that the public had, due to previous announcements that the practice of allocating top jobs along partisan lines would be abandoned. "There is no doubt that it is better to implement some kind of competition for directors of public companies, and for some conditions to be proscribed, than not. No one can fully expect on the basis of what is written that public enterprises will become something outside of party control. What remains at the will of the government of Serbia is the question of who they will choose from a list of three candidates. It could happen that a second or third (candidate) from the list is selected, instead of the best. And that can affect the candidates to refrain from applying, as they would not confident of having the political support in addition to their expertise," said Nenadic. According to him, the draft law leaves out some issues "that are a problem": "I refer to the question of drawing money from public enterprises through sponsorships, advertising and other types of benefits that are not necessary for them to perform their function. Here we have somewhat better control of their spending plans, but something that could be there is missing, namely a blanket ban on extraction of money for those purposes." (Beta, file) B92 Tanjug

Parliament debates bill on public enterprises

A fundamental change from the outgoing solution is the introduction of mandatory invitation for the public to compete for a position vacancy and director of requirements a person has to meet to apply for the position.

One of the requirements is that a director to-be can not be a member of any political party or that their functions in political parties are frozen before and during their time with the enterprise.

The job announcements are to be conducted by an independent expert commission, under a clear procedure that is fully controlled by the public.

The bill provides for the abolition of management boards in public enterprises, with new management structures possible to be organized in two ways - by having a supervisory board and the director-general, or by having a supervisory board, an executive board, made up of the board chairman and executive directors, and the director-general of the enterprise.

The main objective of the bill, according to the Serbian government, is to professionalize public enterprises and an increase in their efficiency and transparency of their work.

Meanwhile, Program Director of Transparency Serbia Nemanja Nenadić told told Radio B92 that the proposed law was better than the present, but at the same time "far from expectations" that the public had, due to previous announcements that the practice of allocating top jobs along partisan lines would be abandoned.

"There is no doubt that it is better to implement some kind of competition for directors of public companies, and for some conditions to be proscribed, than not. No one can fully expect on the basis of what is written that public enterprises will become something outside of party control. What remains at the will of the government of Serbia is the question of who they will choose from a list of three candidates. It could happen that a second or third (candidate) from the list is selected, instead of the best. And that can affect the candidates to refrain from applying, as they would not confident of having the political support in addition to their expertise," said Nenadić.

According to him, the draft law leaves out some issues "that are a problem":

"I refer to the question of drawing money from public enterprises through sponsorships, advertising and other types of benefits that are not necessary for them to perform their function. Here we have somewhat better control of their spending plans, but something that could be there is missing, namely a blanket ban on extraction of money for those purposes."