Lack of Transparency on Bosnia Flood Cash Slated

A new report by Brana [Dam], a coalition of 23 NGOs formed at the end of 2014 to monitor the transparency of recovery projects and international donations used in Bosnia after the floods, highlights the lack of transparency on use of reconstruction money.

"Reviewing the spending of the funds done through government institutions [where public institutions appear as implementing bodies of reconstruction projects], we can say that we know where and how only 54 per cent of the funds were spent ... while we do not have enough information about the remaining 46 per cent," the report reads.

During 2015, Brana monitored the use of 380,320,238.29 KM [around ?194 million], provided by donor organisations and Bosnian institutions for reconstruction.

Of this sum, 195 million KM [?99 million] was allocated directly through government institutions, whose transparency Brana has especially criticised.

"The fact that we don't have enough information about 46 per cent of the funds spent through Bosnian institutions basically means that we are not able to trace the entire process of spending, from the allocation of the funds to the contractors and final beneficiaries," Ana Lucic, coordinator of Brana, told BIRN.

Transparency improved when it came to tracking the use of funds allocated by international donors, however.

"We know where and how 90 per cent of these funds were spent," the report says. "We don't have all the data about realization of the remaining 10 per cent because these projects that are still ongoing," it adds.

As Lucic told BIRN earlier last week, international donations represented only 17 per cent of the total aid promised to Bosnia after the floods of May 2014.

According to Brana, a total of 1,580,472,698.85 KM ...