The Court of Accounts participated in the presentation of the independent civil society report

On July 23, Tatiana Șevciuc, President of the Court of Accounts of the Republic of Moldova (CoARM), participated in the public event presenting the Independent Monitoring Report No. 1, titled "Assessment of Moldova's Progress in Implementing the European Commission's Recommendations in the Context of the EU Accession Process."

The event was organized by the Independent Analytical Center "Expert-Grup" in partnership with the Institute for European Policies and Reforms (IEPR), Institutum Virtutes Civilis (IVC), and the “Friedrich Ebert” Foundation.

During the launch event, the main findings and recommendations of the monitoring report were presented, analyzing the extent to which the European Commission's recommendations from Cluster 1 "Fundamentals" of the accession process were taken into consideration by Moldovan authorities.

The report aims to evaluate the dynamics of reforms implemented by the government in the EU accession process, in line with the Commission's recommendations, and to inform about the exercise of preparing the European Commission's first Enlargement Report for Moldova. In this context, the important role that civil society involvement can play in promoting the Europeanization agenda was discussed.

The subjects and chapters monitored in the report include: democracy, public administration reform, justice reform, the fight against corruption, public procurement, statistics, financial control, etc.

In the "Financial Control" chapter, three recommendations were made, which scored a total of 3.7 out of 5 points. The first recommendation, "Implementation of the Court of Accounts Development Strategy," scored 4 out of 5 points. The report highlighted the main developments and progress made by the CoARM. As part of implementing the Court of Accounts Development Strategy and SIGMA recommendations, a new organizational structure was approved in 2023, and a draft law amending Article 133 of the Constitution of Moldova was developed. This draft law aims to ensure all types of independence for the CoARM—organizational, functional, operational, and financial—along with the status of the Court of Accounts and a reasonable term for the president's mandate.

The event also addressed the main constraints faced by the Supreme Audit Institution, such as the insufficient number of audit staff who migrate to public institutions with higher salaries. Another constraint mentioned in the report is the low rate of implementation of audit recommendations by audited entities.

The experts emphasized in the report that it is a priority for the government to ensure that the salaries of public officials within the CoARM are calculated based on a reference value similar to institutions in the same occupational or professional group, setting the appropriate reference value in the annual state budget law.

The Independent Monitoring Report serves as an essential tool for tracking Moldova's progress in implementing its reform agenda.

The Court of Accounts carried out an audit at the Ministry of Culture

Future priorities of the Court of Accounts discussed with the EU Ambassador to Moldova