Български
The Anti-Corruption Fund Foundation (ACF) has launched a new project to mobilise civic activists and strengthen local communities’ capacity to combat corruption, conflicts of interest, and other abuses.
The project, Civic Efforts for Accountability and Integrity at the Local Level, will be implemented over 15 months in partnership with the Initiative BG, based in Burgas, and Business Incubator – Gotse Delchev. Activities are also planned in the towns of Galabovo, Dimitrovgrad, and Bobov Dol.
“For five years now, the ACF has been working with local communities to increase the transparency, accountability, and integrity of local authorities in accordance with the principles of good governance,” said Denitsa Rukanova, the project’s coordinator.
“Such changes are possible only with the active participation of citizens in the policy-making process and depend on the capacity of local communities to monitor the decisions and actions of local authorities.”
Building on the experience already gained in 13 cities and towns through the programme Local Integrity, the ACF and its partners will train citizen volunteers to use the available legal mechanisms to monitor the activities of local authorities and participate in decision-making. To this end, a compendium of good governance practices and a handbook for its implementation will be created. The compendium will be based on the Standard for Accountability and Integrity at the Local Level, which the ACF has already developed. Another deliverable of the new initiative will be a report for the municipal authorities in the five cities with recommendations on how to improve governance and increase citizen engagement.
The project complements the work that the ACF has already done to monitor the activities of the now-defunct Commission for the Counteracting of Corruption — the central body responsible for identifying conflicts of interest and combating corruption at all levels of governance, including at the local level. The ACF analyses the commission’s achievements in its annual monitoring reports on the activities of Bulgarian anti-corruption institutions.
The project Civic Efforts for Accountability and Integrity at the Local Level is implemented with the support of the Swiss-Bulgarian Cooperation Programme, Civic Engagement and Transparency Facility 2024–2029.
The views and opinions expressed are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the governments of Switzerland and Bulgaria.
