On 5 April 2016, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Council of Europe publicly launched two reports assessing the risks of corruption in the public procurement and prosecution system.

Over the past decade, the Council of Europe and the United Nations Development Programme have been providing continuous assistance to Moldova in strengthening the institutional capacities and systems for effective combatting and preventing of corruption via monitoring, standard setting and technical assistance.    

“Corruption in Moldova remains one of the main impediments to sustainable socio-economic development. Even though most of the formal ingredients of a solid anti-corruption architecture, including institutional framework and legislation, have been put in place, a number of formidable challenges still remain to be addressed”,  stated the Deputy Resident Representative at UNDP Moldova, Narine Sahakyan.

„We are aware of how much this cancer jeopardises the democratic process, we are aware of how much attacks everything, from health sector to justice, from systemic corruption to petty corruption. Taking into account the seriousness of this issue, we are here to help tackling these challenges”, said the head of the Council of Europe Office in Chisinau, Jose-Luis Herrero.

The joint event brought together over 50 representatives of central public authorities, development partners, civil society and mass media.

The analysis carried out by UNDP, “The Report on the assessment of the corruption risks in the public procurement system of the Republic of Moldova” was carried out during November 2015 – January 2016, with the financial support of the Ministry of External Affairs of Norway.

The Report has identified more deficiencies in the legislative and institutional framework in the field. Among these, is the lack of control mechanisms to detect corruption, in particular control over contract execution; the weak technical capacity of the working groups’ members from the contracting authorities, in particular at the local level, as well as frequent cases of conflicts of interest among the members of these groups; ineffective complaints settlement and weak system of law enforcement.

An innovative aspect for this sector, proposed under the project, is the System of fraud and corruption indicators for the whole scope of the procurement process, indicators based on the Red Flag concept. This system of indicators represents a warning mechanism about the eventual illegalities both for contracting authorities, as well as for those responsible for supervision and external control/audit in this field.

The Report on the corruption risk assessment within the Prosecutor’s Office of the Republic of Moldova was developed by the Council of Europe following the corruption risk evaluation mission in the Prosecutor’s Office, organized during the period 15-16 October 2015.

The Report notes that the problems from the Republic of Moldova do not necessarily represent the product of a poor legislation, but are rather arising mainly from a culture of corruption tolerance and acceptance. The existence of improper influence on the prosecution service, determines the need to intensify the efforts with a view to the optimization of criminal prosecution in corruption cases.

The Report comes with a number of recommendations that refer to the need for a substantive and comprehensive reform of the Prosecution system, referring mainly to the establishment of a single body with exclusive competences in handling cases of corruption, enhancing transparency and accountability of the actors involved, systematic reliance on research and property confiscation, strengthening the legislation on unjustified possession of wealth and, not least important, increasing the wages of actors involved in combating corruption, in particular, prosecutors.

Further, UNDP, in partnership with the National Anticorruption Centre (NAC), shall train representatives of central and local public authorities with a view to a better management of the risks of corruption in public procurement.

In its turn, the Council of Europe is in the process of developing a project on the risks of corruption, to be financed by the European Union and implemented by the Council of Europe.