ActionSEE Grantees

Grants for implementation of six-month projects have been awarded to 18 civil society organizations from six countries: Macedonia, Serbia, Albania, Kosovo, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, which will address urgent local and national issues in the upcoming period in order to advance good governance and the rule of law.

These grants are dedicated to local civil society organizations, and have been awarded within the ACTION SEE – Accountability, Technology and Institutional Openness Network in SEE project, which is implemented by Metamorphosis Foundation in partnership with Westminster Foundation for Democracy from Great Britain, CRTA – Center for Research, Transparency and Accountability from Serbia, Citizens Association Why not? from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Center for Democratic Transition from Montenegro, Open Data Kosovo – ODK and Levizja Mjaft! from Albania, with financial support of the European Union.

Grantees from Macedonia:

  • JEF Macedonia – implements the project “Nothing else matters? Cases of corruption in the civil servants’ employment in the local governments in Macedonia” that will address the issue of irregularities with regard to civil servants’ employment and advancement. Thereafter, the implementation of this project would: (1) help local governments in increasing the transparency regarding employment and advancement of civil servants; (2) cooperate with state institutions on increasing the monitoring of employment and advancement of civil servants in local governments. With conducting qualitative and quantitative research in three statistically selected municipalities the project aims to contribute towards a dynamic and just working environment in local governments, where employments and advancements of civil servants are performed according to merit.”
  • Association for Promotion and Development of an Inclusive Society INKLUZIVA – “Public Information Accessible to Persons with Disabilities” project aims at assessing, evaluating and improving the current level of access that persons with disabilities have to municipal websites in the Northeastern region of Macedonia.
  • Institute for Strategic Research and Education – ISIE – “Budno Oko – Platform for Monitoring of the Use of Public Funds in Secondary Education of Macedonia” project aims at improving the oversight and access to information related to the use of public funds in the funding of secondary education in Macedonia.
  • Association Proficio – “In the Spotlight: Overcoming Breach of Duty in Macedonia” project aims to contribute toward the implementation of practical mechanisms for establishing and institutionalizing high standards of ethical conduct and good governance for elected officials, civil servants and the general public through lobbying and advocacy in Macedonia.
  • Common Values – “Commissions for Interethnic Relations (CIRs) and Ethnic Communities” project has the aim to strengthen the interethnic relations, institutions of the system and democracy in Macedonia as well as to accelerate the EU accession process.
  • Association for youth and marginalized groups: Center for Integration and development – “The importance of usage of languages of the communities for good governance at local level in the municipalities of Kumanovo, Cair and Lipkovo”Jointly with the local TV station FESTA, Association for youth and marginalized groups: Center for Integration and development will work on the advancement of the Law for usage of languages through documenting and monitoring the implementation of the law for usage of languages in certain institutions in the local government through the project “The importance of usage of languages of the communities for good governance at local level in the municipalities of Kumanovo, Cair and Lipkovo”. The project focuses on the definition of the framework (what are the cases that the selected institutions at local level use other language beside the Macedonian language for communication with the citizens), documenting the existing procedures (completion/finalization of the existing guidebooks and rules used by the municipal officers for communication with citizens who speak a language other than Macedonian language), evaluating/establishing the capacities of the selected institutions whether there is a staffed unit (department, sector) that enables communication of the institution in a language other than the Macedonian language, and preparing and presenting a report that will contain a list of good practices and recommendations.
  • Association Initiative of unemployed intellectuals (www.ini.org.mk) – “The Citizen is the real inspector”
    Together with the NGO,,HOPE”  and TV STAR, the Association Initiative of unemployed intellectuals will work on reducing the number of violations of labor rights through the activation of the Labor Inspectorate in the East Planning Region in the Republic of North Macedonia. The project is envisioned to achieve its objectives through  campaign for promotion of Law for Labor relation in the social media and Regional TV STAR, organising round tables in 11 municipalities, creating a platform for reporting violations of labor rights: submitting requests for information of public character to the regional units of the Labor Inspectorate, analysing the received data from the reporting platform and the received responses from the submitted requests to the Labor Inspectorate, creating a video with relevant stakeholders and testimonies of victims of labor exploitation and having a final event for the promotion of the project’s achievements.
  • Coalition of Civil Associations ”All for Fair Trials” – CAFT (www.all4fairtrials.org.mk) – “CAFT Trial dossier”
    Coalition of Civil Associations ”All for Fair Trials” (CAFT) in partnership with Radio MOF (www.radiomof.mk) is implementing the project “CAFT Trial Dossier” which aims to improve the citizens’ trust in the judiciary in North Macedonia, improve the transparency of the Primary Court Skopje 1 and the transparency of the Special Prosecutors Office (SPO), as well as to ease the access to information related to high- profile court cases for media, researchers, students and general public. For this purpose, CAFT will create a sub domain of its web page (sub- page) where at least 20 case files of high-profile criminal cases initiated by the SPO will be published. These case files will contain all the available public data, such as case summaries, general information, timeline, indictments, motions, decisions and verdicts, as well as trial monitoring reports, systematized in both chronological and thematical, easy to use format. The sub page will be promoted on a public event which will be live streamed, as well as via social media, mailing lists, and radio products.
  • Eko-Natyra (www.ekonatyra.org) – “Good governance for a good environment”
    Eko-Natyra in cooperation with TV Koha will work on the implementation of the project “Good governance for a good environment” which aims to increase the citizens engagement in policy making related to environmental issues on local level, or more specifically, to provide recommendations for citizen participation in policy making on local government level on issues related to environment (using Tetovo as a sample municipality), to present a model for citizen participation related to environmental protection on local government level and to lobby for an increased budget transparency on local level (pertinent to environment protection).