In 2020, Serbia will have higher salaries and pensions, and lower taxes with positive economic growth.
Exports in the information technology (IT) sector have increased, Serbia has many more experts in this field, and older citizens have become digital and everyone has access to the Internet.
Businesses are completed without problems through the state administration - which is also digitized.
This is what Serbia would look like if Ana Brnabić fulfilled all the promises from exposition in 2017, when she first became prime minister.
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Now that it is again appointed as the mandate holder for the composition of the new government, the BBC investigated what the prime minister has accomplished in the meantime in three areas - the progress of the economy, joining the European Union, as well as the digitalization of state administration with the development of the IT sector.
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1. Are people in Serbia richer?
The Prime Minister's intention in 2017 was to lead the government's fiscal policy so that the deficit would be one percent in two years. She also promised to increase salaries and pensions and reduce taxes.
Ljubodrag Savić, a professor at the Faculty of Economics in Belgrade, tells the BBC in Serbian that "he has to admit that the prime minister was close - if only there was no corona".
In this case the situation is completely different.
"Financial consolidation would have happened if the pandemic had not broken out," says Savić.
"Nevertheless, as it is - the deficit is at the level of 2014, when we entered austerity measures and had the worst possible economic situation".
For Savić, it is problematic how Serbia achieved this financial consolidation.
"The measures produced results, the deficit was reduced, but some people bore a heavy burden. These are primarily pensioners, and then people in the public sector," says Savić.
He points out that the plans were adopted so that the deficit is low, while pensions are increased - "and that is a calculation that does not go hand in hand".
"Pensioners have been sacrificed here and not only now, but for the last 30 years, and these are the people who support entire families and who can no longer earn money," says the economist.
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This is how we came to a situation where the average pension is 47,5 percent of the average salary, and the current law allows it to be at least 50 percent, adds Savić.
"The Swiss formula we adopted is the worst for those who have the smallest pension, so a 5,5 percent increase to 15.000 dinars does not mean much," he says.
Additional promises made by Brnabić included a package of measures to reduce taxes and contributions, and Savić thinks that these benefits mostly concern the employer, not the employee.
"While Brnabić was in the National Alliance for Local Economic Development (Naled), I read a study in which that organization announced that the total burden of taxes and contributions was 39,4 percent, which is less than the average of the European Union," says the professor at the Faculty of Economics to the faculty.
"We need to think about how much these salaries will be, and not just encourage employment".
Average salary
Announcing the name of the representative for the composition of the new government, Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić said on Monday, October 5, that "the average salary today is 511 euros" and that he "believes that it will still grow despite the corona."
He added that salaries should be 2025 euros by 900, and pensions should be 410 euros.
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"This government plans to continue rigorous control of spending money and maintain fiscal discipline and responsibility in the management of public finances," Brnabić pointed out in an exposé three years ago.
However, numerous examples from previous years, as well as the situation during the first mandate, did not really speak in favor of the continuous practice of strict control of money from the state coffers.
For example, the Government of Serbia ignored the law for four years, and did not submit the final budget accounts for 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018 to the National Assembly. The government submitted this documentation to the Parliament only in September 2019.
"The legal obligation to adopt the law on the final account has not been respected since 2002, but at least that document was submitted to the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia until 2014.
"In that way, that document was public, that is, available to the public.
Since 2015, that practice has been discontinued, and since then we do not know how each individual ministry spent the money," he explained President of the Fiscal Council of Serbia Pavle Petrović for Insider at the end of 2018.
From more recent news, there are the results of the international research The budget openness index, published at the end of April 2020, which shows that Serbia has fallen eight places on this list compared to 2017.
Serbia is now in 70th place out of 117 countries, announced is the organization Transparency Serbia.
As they pointed out, "Serbia is by far the worst rated in terms of public participation in budget creation, with only two points (world average is 14)".
Did the jobs become comparable during the prime minister's term?
"We are continuing the reform of the salary system. All jobs in the general state will become comparable.
"It will be known exactly how much each workplace is valued, not only absolutely, as before, but also relatively, in relation to other workplaces and other sectors", stated Ana Brnabić three years ago.
She pointed out that the result of all this should be equal pay for equal work, regardless of which segment of the public sector it is in question.
However, as Truthometer already is wrote, the reform of the salary system and the introduction of salary grades is a long-standing problem that Serbia is facing, and instead of solutions, political actors have traditionally been stringing together new deadlines and new promises for years.
The last one in a series of deadlines - January 1, 2021.
European Commission on the Progress of Serbia
In the latest report The European Commission assessed that Serbia has made progress when it comes to economic and fiscal issues.
It is stated that there has been a reduction in the budget deficit and reasonable fiscal activities, but that there are no fiscal reforms.
When it comes to economic criteria, Serbia has made some progress and is moderately prepared, that is, at a good level of preparedness for the development of a functional market economy.
The EC also called on Serbia to respect the EU standards and rules for investments, state aid, and assessment of the environmental impact of investments.
"All investment decisions should follow EU standards on public procurement, state aid, environmental impact assessment and cost-benefit analysis," the report states.
The report adds that before the crisis with the coronavirus, the pace of growth was BDP accelerated with the strengthening of domestic demand.
The EU assessed that external imbalances increased, but that Serbia's finances remained "healthy" thanks to the inflow of direct foreign investments, as well as that by reducing the budget deficit and wise fiscal policy, Serbia significantly improved debt sustainability.
The report also assesses that the performance of the labor market has improved, with the lowest unemployment rate in the last ten years.
However, as it is added, this is partly the result of large emigration.
However, the Covid-19 crisis has greatly worsened the economic outlook for 2020, especially when it comes to GDP growth, public finances and employment.
2. Is Serbia closer to the EU?
Eight negotiation chapters were opened during the mandate of the previous government, while ten were opened from the beginning of negotiations in 2014 to June 2017. There are 35 chapters in total.
However, for the first time since the beginning of the negotiations on joining the European Union, Serbia did not open a single chapter in six months, and in 2019 it opened only one - chapter 9 on financial services.
During that time, for example, in 2020, Montenegro opened the last chapter in the process of joining the European Union.
One of the main messages from Brussels is that it will insist on the rule of law and judicial reform, a in the latest report of the European Commission it is emphasized that Serbia has not made any progress when it comes to electoral processes or the judicial system.
Moderate progress, it is added, has been achieved in the fight against corruption (structural reforms and cooperation between agencies) and public administration reforms.
The text of the exposition from 2017 on the subject of joining the European Union has a very enthusiastic and ambitious tone, Sena Marić from the Center for European Policies tells the BBC in Serbian.
"It cannot be said that this was the way of work of the outgoing government, although the government had all the favorable preconditions to work dedicatedly on the process of Serbia's accession to the EU," she emphasized.
And those preconditions, he adds, were a stable majority and the dominant pro-European orientation of the majority of political actors.
During the tenure of the previous government, Serbia's strategic goal of joining the EU was called into question, Marić believes, "by controversial statements of the highest officials on several occasions".
"Among other things, the President's address to the nation during the introduction of the state of emergency on March 15, when he declared that European solidarity is a dead letter," she says.
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The exposition envisages a revision of the National Program for alignment with the EU acquis.
"During the tenure of the previous government, he was published irregularly, because he cannot be traced since September 2019," adds Marić.
"According to the latest available data, the degree of its fulfillment was below 50 percent, which reflects the level of commitment of the previous government to the integration of Serbia into the EU".
Such a poor performance of the opening of the chapter can be linked to the "chronically poor results of the previous Government in areas related to the rule of law, especially chapter 23", claims the researcher.
"Given that the Negotiating Framework for Serbia states that the entire accession process can be frozen if it is estimated that Serbia is stagnating or regressing in chapters 23 and 24, which are justice, freedom and security, and 35, which are other issues, mostly related to Kosovo," she adds.
3. What happened to digitization?
Digitization and education - these are the priorities that the current Prime Minister of Serbia, Ana Brnabić, highlighted as key for her mandate, during her presentation at the end of June 2017.
Although without more precise deadlines, Brnabić announced that some of her main goals will be - increasing exports in the IT sector, a greater number of experts, digitalization of state administration and education, as well as a general reduction of the digital divide.
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In her exposé, the Prime Minister stated that "in 2016, only 65 percent of households had access to broadband Internet," and that this government's plan is to "get on par with the countries of the European Union by 2020 and for that number to reach 100 percent."
However, that hasn't happened yet.
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Data from the Republic Statistical Office (RZS) for the year 2019, show that 79,6 percent of households have a broadband Internet connection.
The last information about what is happening with the further introduction of the broadband network in Serbia was published on June 9 this year.
At that time, the Ministry of Telecommunications announced that a project to build broadband infrastructure in rural areas had been launched, and that "the implementation of the first phase of this project will only begin in the spring of 2021".
E-management
"The digitization of the state administration and the provision of services to citizens who will use them in a simple and fast way is one of my priorities," the Prime Minister pointed out.
When it comes to eGovernment, this portal has often given citizens headaches over the past decade, since the system often "crashed" and was "buggy". it says Startit.
After almost 11 years, in February 2020, the Office for Electronic Administration announced that it was finally launched new eGovernment portal.
However, how many citizens actually use this portal?
RZS data showed are that in 2017, only 32 percent used the services of the eGovernment portal, instead of, as stated, "making personal contacts or visiting public institutions or administration bodies".
In 2018, this percentage increased to 37,3, while in 2019 recorded a slight shift of 0,2 percent.
IT exports are growing, but not professional staff
When it comes to the lack of professional IT personnel in Serbia, this problem, although clearly indicated in the exposé of the Prime Minister, is not even close to being solved, writes Istinomer.
According to the last one estimate According to the Informatics Society of Serbia (DIS), Serbia currently lacks 20.000 IT engineers.
According to their estimation, the increase in the export of software services will reach "1,3 to 1,4 billion euros" this year, which exactly corresponds to the Prime Minister's promise from 2017, that "exports in the IT sector will be increased to 1,5 billion euros" annually for five years".
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However, in order to continue the accelerated development, DIS President Nikola Marković points out that it is necessary to "increase the recently increased enrollment quota for IT studies from 20 percent to 100 percent".
U analizi about the faster IT development of Serbia and the role of the state in that process, the Serbian IT Observatory (SITA) pointed to "a possible negative scenario and the consequences of a strong focus on exports, while at the same time local IT needs are neglected".
DIS and SITA appeal that "the average investment in ICT be raised from the current 82 euros to 150 euros per capita (the average in the EU is 800 euros per capita)".
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