The Socialist People's Party (SNP) announced today that "it did not want to participate in the pre-prepared and designed Public Debate on the Law on the Census of 2021, by the former management of the Statistics Directorate (Monstat) or rather by the Democratic Party of Socialists ( DPS), for several reasons".
They added that the Ministry of Finance and Social Welfare (MFSS), according to the previously prepared Program by the Directorate of Statistics, recently announced a public debate on the Law on the Population Census in 2021.
"The program of the public discussion defines that "due to the current epidemiological situation in the country and the declaration of the new coronavirus pandemic, respecting the recommendations of the competent institutions, and with the aim of preventing its spread, we consider it justified that the public discussion does not have a round table, but proposals, suggestions and comments on the Draft of the Law on the Census of Population, Households and Apartments in 2021 can be submitted to the Ministry of Finance and Social Welfare" (in writing). The public debate organized in this way lasted 20 days and ended on October 3, 2021, after which the MFSS, ten days later, published a report on the conducted public debate signed by Minister Spajić," the SNP press release states.
The party also said that the report was also published on the official website of the MFSS.
The SNP also said that in the Report on the conducted public debate, the remarks, proposals and suggestions presented in written or electronic form were received from nine different addresses for which, as stated in the Report, the authorized representatives, two representatives of the MFSS and four representatives of Monstat, prepared the reasons for their acceptance or non-acceptance.
"The first reason why the SNP did not want to participate in the public debate prepared in this way is that the public debate was not, as indicated in the title, public and transparent. And it had to be, first of all, because of better public communication about the time of implementation not only through the official website, but also through more frequent information through the means of public information in order to include a larger number of relevant participants. Another reason is the inability to publicly present and confront the opinions of different users of statistical information in terms of making the right reasons and decisions for accepting or not accepting given proposals, suggestions and comments and that it does not depend only on the authorized representatives of the Ministry of Finance and Monstat," the SNP statement reads.
They said that they believe that such a public discussion does not satisfy one of the main reasons for the existence of statistics, which is, as they say, the satisfaction of national interests, as well as the fact that it is not in accordance with several principles on which official statistics are based, primarily with the principle of impartiality and objectivity in terms of equal treatment of users.
"This is especially due to the fact that the dismissal in the Directorate for Statistics did not end with the dismissal of Ms. Gordana Radojević as the director of this institution, but we justifiably believe that the entire procedure in the preparation of the census by her associates continues to be meaningless, with the aim of not conducting the census or is carried out, but that during the implementation it is interrupted or that the results are not published in the end due to certain such or similar omissions in the process of preparing this largest and most complex statistical action," the announcement reads.
They also said that in the process of working on parliamentary subcommittees, they will pay detailed attention to the Draft Law on the Census, when their representatives will point out the omissions and shortcomings of the Draft Law on the Population Census.
"It is not our intention to act in a partisan and political way, but we want to, as a serious political party, contribute to the creation of conditions for transparent work, which is a condition for conducting the population census, which will obviously not be conducted in 2021, as the previous management in Monstat had planned. The SNP is not was and will not be one of the instruments of the previous and current unchanged composition of Monstat's management instructed by DPS", the announcement concludes.
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