With the latest amendments to the Electoral Code from February 2020, some improvements have been made, primarily in voter registration, in voting procedures, and in expanding and clarifying the competencies of the State Audit Office (SAO) and the State Commission for Prevention of Corruption (SCPC) on financial control. However, the election model remained with six constituencies (in the country) and with a proportional collection of results, favoring only the major parties and reducing citizen participation and cyclically causing political crises. This is the main finding of the Metamorphosis survey conducted in May 2020, as part of a regional project that […]

The work of the new composition of the Anti-Corruption Commission, the commitment of several civil society organizations and the prospects of the new Law on Public Prosecution are the only lights in the tunnel of the reform achievements of North Macedonia in the field of anti-corruption and the fight against organized crime in 2019 and early 2020. This is the main finding of a survey conducted by the Metamorphosis Foundation during a regional good governance project in April 2020. The enormous number of cases that the State Commission for the Prevention of Corruption (SCPC) is facing and the cooperation with […]

The key area for faster EU integration, the functioning of the legal state and the rule of law, in one word – the judiciary, is currently in a strange situation difficult to define. Progress has been registered compared to 2019 both in terms of the legal framework and in terms of advancing the practice in some segments of the judiciary. With the adoption of the new Law on Public Prosecution on the last day of the session of the Parliament, 16 February 2020, the legal framework was, de facto, completed. All key laws in the area referring both the judiciary […]

Being familiar with the yo-yo effect in many areas that are critical to democracy in the Republic of North Macedonia, we titled last year’s media sector reform survey “Media Reforms – Never Enough”. We assessed this are as generally positive but also cautioned against the dangers if the reforms are not continued. An additional problem for the viability of commercial media is the pandemic with the new coronavirus and the disease it causes – the COVID-19. As part of the fight against the spread of the disease, despite restrictive measures by the state, the media is increasingly complaining that many […]

The reform of the most complicated part of society for reforming – the public administration – is advancing, though not at the desired speed and in segmentation. This would be the basic conclusion of the second consecutive survey of the course of public administration reforms that we conducted in January this year.

Between December 2018 and March 2019, the consortium of 6 regional countries as well as the Westminster Foundation for Democracy developed the Regional Openness Index, which served as an indicator regarding the measuring of the level of transparency of governments and ministries of the Western Balkans countries as well as availability of information to citizens. The Regional Roadmap on good governance of the Western Balkans countries unites the separate national action plans of the Western Balkans countries and incorporates high level recommendations for each institution to improve the transparency. Following the principles of transparency, this paper lays down a series of issues: ...

Openness represents a key condition for democracy – since it allows citizens to receive information and knowledge necessary for equal participation in political life, effective decision making and holding institutions accountable for policies which they conduct. Institutions worldwide undertake specific activities with the aim to enhance their transparency and accountability before the citizens. The Roadmap on good governance for state institutions in the Republic of Macedonia (2018) can be viewed here: https://cutt.ly/XrR31jQ

In cooperation with the partners from the “ACTION SEE” regional NGO network, Metamorphosis Foundation for Internet and Society prepared the policy paper in which we analyze the level of transparency, openness, accountability of the local self-government in the Western Balkans region. This visualization presents part of the key findings of the research on the openness of the local self-government in the region and North Macedonia. The data shows that the most open municipality in North Macedonia is the Municipality of Strumica. However, the average openness index of the local self-government in Macedonia stands at 25%, which is under the regional […]

Metamorphosis Foundation for Internet and Society, in collaboration with partners from the regional network of NGOs “ACTION SEE”, has prepared the latest study of public policy analyzing the level of transparency, openness, accountability of the judiciary in the Western Balkans. This visualization presents some of the key findings from the survey of judicial openness in the region and in North Macedonia. According to the Openness Index, the most open court in North Macedonia is the Supreme Court. However, the Public Prosecutor’s Office meets only 4% of the openness indicators and again ranks last in the region. The entire analysis is […]