OREANDA-NEWS. Prime Minister Valeriu Strelet today participated at the conference on launching the SIGMA project on assessing public administration in Moldova.

Head of EU Delegation in Chisinau Pirkka Tapiola and Head of Support for Improvement in Governance and Management (SIGMA) Karen Hill also attended the event.

The prime minister said that SIGMA’s assessment of the Moldovan public administration was, in fact, a complete radiography of the public administration through the principles of good governance at the level of the European Union. Valeriu Strelet said that the project came at the moment the government was creating the conditions to plenary start the multidimensional reform of the public administration, without which the state could embark an irreversible systemic collapse. "The public administration reform is one of the major arrear in the implementation of the Association Agreement with the EU in 2014-2015. We are in the unfortunate situation where holding a public office is neither attractive nor motivating for good, upright professionals", the premier said.

In the context, Valeriu Strelet said that a first step in creating conditions to approach the public administration reform in a comprehensive and systemic way was the establishment of the National Council for the Public Administration Reform. "The Council is a high-level platform for making decisions on strategic directions for the public administration reform. It will provide an integrated process of strategic planning, implementation and monitoring of the government’s policies in the field of public administration, both at the central and local level", the prime minister said.

For his part, Head of EU Delegation in Chisinau Pirkka Tapiola pointed out that the public administration reform represented an important and fundamental moment for Moldova's EU integration process. "We want to encourage the Moldovan public institutions involved in this process of cooperation with the SIGMA team of experts and the government, to promote the public administration reform for a more equitable and transparent governance in the country", the European official said.

SIGMA is a joint initiative of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the European Union (EU), financed mainly by the EU.

In April 2015, the EU Delegation to Moldova requested SIGMA to review and evaluate the administration in Moldova based on SIGMA’s measurement reference methodology, recently developed for IPA (Instrument for Pre-Accession) countries within the principles of public administration. The principles and methodology were developed by SIGMA in the period 2013-2014 and successfully tested in all IPA countries in 2015.

The principles of public administration reflect the key areas of the public administration reform (PAR): the strategic framework of the reform; developing and coordinating policies; public service and human resource management; the administration’s accountability; providing services; public finance management (including the external audit and public procurement). The SIGMA analysis’ conclusions and recommendations will help the government to plan and implement reforms, and the EU Delegation as well as other development partners to plan assistance in the field of the public administration reform.