The Transparency Week entitled “Living together in multicultural societies: respect, dialogue, interaction” has been opened in Chisinau. The event is aimed at bringing the Chisinau City Hall closer to the people and at establishing a more constructive dialogue between the local public authorities and the citizens, IPN reports.
The State Chancellery, together with the development partners, launched an appeal to the local authorities, urging them to carry out more activities designed to bring the people closer to the decisions of the mayor’s office. The event is staged within the European Local Democracy Week that is marked annually in all the member states of the European community.
“Moldova reiterates the assumed commitment to decentralize, develop and adopt decisional transparency at the local level. The local mayor’s offices are the allies of the State Chancellery. It is important to have well-informed and active citizens who become involved in community life,” said Sergiu Ceaus, the Government’s deputy secretary general.
The Transparency Week includes events to increase the people’s participation in meetings of the local administration, the Open Doors Day, the auditing of the implementation of the local budget and meetings centering on administrative transparency for councilors.
“We, the mayors, need experience exchange. Our society is affected by the mentality created in the Soviet period, but we now have good results and have the possibility of communicating through the Internet, optical fiber and with the people, through email and social networking sites. I set the goal of improving the relations and communication with the people. The people can now take part in the meetings of the local council,” said the mayor of Budesti village of Chisinau municipality Nina Costiuc.
“The theme of the Transparency Week is very appropriate to Moldova, which is a multiethnic and cultural society, where all the minorities need to be united. The building of democracy and the decentralization of the public authorities are methods of engaging the people in the country’s successful accomplishments. What Moldova lacks is a united voice and also a mechanism to make the authorities responsible. If this is created, it will enable the people’s voices to be heard and these could be involved in all the democratic processes in the country,” said UNDP Resident Representative in Moldova Dafina Gercheva.
The Transparency Week is organized under the auspices of the State Chancellery and the Joint Integrated Local Development Program. Within it, there were distributed insignias “In the people’s service” for public functionaries, posters for mayor’s offices with the wording “Mirror of transparency and participation of councilors” and “Transparency map”, and posters for activity planning and boards with the words “They decide transparently here”.
