Skopje, 25 October 2024 (MIA) - Minister of European Affairs Orhan Murtezani held Friday a press briefing to present the 2024-2027 North Macedonia Reform Agenda that the European Commission has officially approved.

The Reform Agenda is part of the Growth Plan for the Western Balkans worth EUR 6 billion, of which the country should get EUR 750 million, with the first tranche in the amount of EUR 52.5 million expected by the year-end.

Minister Murtezani said that payments in line with the Reform and Growth Facility are conditioned by certain criteria, meaning that the reform should first be implemented on the basis of certain standards while respecting certain qualitative and quantitative steps, so that the country can first ask for a payment followed by its approval.

Murtezani said the payment could be done twice a year since all reforms are tied to dates - June and December. In case of a negative assessment, namely a European Commission evaluation on non-compliance of certain requirements, the release of the funds will be blocked until the reforms are met.

The Minister sees the weak link in the Reform Agenda implementation, i.e. the funds' absorption capacity, noting that some ministries are lacking professional staff, while others are improperly structured.

"The biggest headache is the structure for implementation of the Reform Agenda. The ministry received certain general guidelines on how the entire structure of monitoring and evaluation should look like. This structure will generally be coordinated by the Ministry of European Affairs, in cooperation with the Ministry of Finance. Each ministry will be in charge of a certain area," said Murtezani.

According to him, the second challenge is the list of projects, since this now looks like a wish list, and those projects must mature in order to remain on the list.

"The goal of the Reform Agenda is to prepare the country to be an EU member. As Minister of European Affairs, I will report on the process at every government session. I have even given my co-workers three cards - green, yellow and red - so that the institutions that fully implement reforms will be given the green card, those that experience setbacks will be presented with the yellow one, whereas the ones that delay reforms will receive the red card. I do not mind in making this process public, because I want ministries to experience public pressure in order to implement reforms. Elections are the punishment when it comes to politics. If we fail to absorb all funds and if certain ministries are not successful in this, they will in a way be penalized," said Murtezani.

The Reform and Growth Facility also includes rules on the timeframe for the reform implementation.

"There is a so-called grace period of 24 months, but we will have to follow the dynamics that has been set outside this grace period. We should maybe even forget this grace period and use it only in exceptional cases, because if we rely on it, then tasks will pile up for the next year and we will come to 2027 when it would be impossible to realize too many tasks," said Ministry advisor Dragan Tilev.

The Reform Agenda includes 37 reforms in 136 steps across five areas: Public Finance Management and Public Administration Reforms; Green Energy and Digitization; Human Capital; Private Sector Development and Business Environment; and Fundamental Values and Rule of Law.

Photo: Ministry of European Affairs