Municipality of Bosilegrad awarded for good governance

On September 19, 2024, Standing Conference of Towns and Municipalities (SCTM) delivered ICT equipment to the municipality of Bosilegrad with a total value of 1.25 million dinars. This equipment is part of the award for best municipal/city administrations in 2023 selected on a competition of the Ministry of State Administration and Local Self-Government and SCTM.

The equipment was handed over to the president of municipality of Bosilegrad, Vladimir Zaharijev, by Nikola Tarbuk, Secretary General of SCTM.

"Continuous strengthening of internal procedures and mechanisms in order to improve procedures contributes to improvement of the quality of services that local self-government provides to citizens. The award to municipality of Bosilegrad for the approach applied in the prevention of the occurrence of corruption confirms that the continuous commitment to aligning actions with the principles of good governance has been recognized and highlighted as an example of good practice that can and should be followed by other towns and municipalities," Secretary General of SCTM Nikola Tarbuk said.

President of municipality of Bosilegrad Vladimir Zaharijev expressed satisfaction with cooperation with SCTM, thanked for the equipment and pointed out that it will significantly help functioning of municipal administration.

Municipality of Bosilegrad received the award in the "Responsibility and rule of law" category for improvement of citizens' rights in the segment of preventing corruption. The award-winning example shows continuous work on harmonizing old and adopting new acts of local self-government, which assess and prevent the risk of corruption.

This annual competition, organized by the Ministry and SCTM for several years in a row, aims to improve actions of local authorities in accordance with the principles of good governance and reward examples of best practice.

In addition to the award to the municipality of Bosilegrad, as examples of best practice in 2023 city of Niš (Efficiency and Effectiveness), Ada municipality (Transparency and public participation in the work of local government) and Pećinci municipality (Equality and anti-discrimination) were awarded. SCTM also delivered technical equipment to these local governments, all within the Program "Partnership for good local self-government", supported by the Swiss Government.

For more information about the Switzerland support in Serbia, visit the website of the Embassy of Switzerland: https://www.eda.admin.ch/belgrade.