Council of Ministers Unlawful Decisions: Recent Decision Violates the Law on Public Procurement

Dear friends, The Council of Ministers has approved Decision No. 531 / 2023 with the purpose of “Creating the State Joint Stock Company “Centered Purchases Operator JSC”, in order to perform Special Public Procurement Procedures”. According to this decision, the Centered Purchases Operator is a joint-stock company, with State Capital, that operates on the basis of the Law on Merchant and Commercial Companies. This decision…

Master Class on Electoral Integrity and Improvement through Data and Evidence-based Processes – Open Data Youth Fellowship

On July 3rd, an event titled “Master Class: Electoral Integrity and Improvement through Data and Evidence-based Processes” was held. This event served as a platform for data analysts participating in the Open Data Fellowship Network’s Youth Capacity Building Program to present to their younger colleagues and those interested in issues related to electoral integrity. The presentations encompassed reports and analyses on this subject. The participants…

Comments and Recommendations on Public Consultation – Amendment to the Law on Public Procurement AIS Open Data Albania

The Albanian Institute of Science, widely recognized as the driving force behind Open Data Albania (AIS/Open Data), has undertaken a thorough review of the Draft Law proposing amendments to the existing Law on Public Procurement. Specifically, we have closely examined the Notice for Public Consultation regarding this draft law, which addresses various additions and changes to Law No. 162, dated December 23, 2020, concerning Public Procurement. The Albanian Government introduced these Draft Amendments on June 20th, and they are currently available on its website for Public Consultation, welcoming input…

Treasury Payments, June 2023

During the last month, from June 1 to June 30, the Treasury has allocated several payments, which total an amount of ALL 41.64 billion distributed. Link Thesari 2019 – Open Spending Albania (data.al) During the same period of the previous year, the Treasury allocated ALL 44.54 billion Thesari 2019 – Open Spending Albania (data.al) From January 1st to June 30rd, 2023, the treasury system has…

Save the date: Open Data Youth Fellowship Master Class on Enhancing Electoral Integrity through Data and Evidence-Based Approaches

Dear friends, We would like to share with you an invitation to participate in a Master Class Event where Data Analysts and activists who have completed the first cycle of training as part of the Open Data Youth Fellowship and Network will share with new members of the Network evidence, analysis and activities on Electoral Integrity, improvement through data and evidence-based processes. Who can participate:…

The need for Electoral Reform. A Projection on the Distribution of 2025 MP Mandates based on the May 2023 votes shows defects in representation

Dear Ladies, Dear Gentlemen, AIS, the organization promoting Open Data Albania, has just published a Projection of how mandates for MPs would be distributed in the 2025 parliamentary elections, if the electoral subjects would run with the Current Electoral Code applied, and secure as many votes as in the May 14 Elections (votes for the representation of the Subjects in the Municipal Councils). This projection…

Tenders in the healthcare sector, 40% of procedures carry risk of clientelism, marked with a red flag

The apprehension, on corruption charges, of a senior official from the Ministry of Health coincides with grim developments in this sector’s public contracting AIS, through its Open Procurement Albania database – the Health category, has been monitoring all relevant procurement procedures for years, assessing and marking with a Red Flag (risk of irregularities and clientelism) several of them, which exhibited clear markers of abuse. Link…

51 Parties have benefited ALL 2.17 billion from Taxpayers in 10 years 2011-2022

AIS has just published an article on the Open Data Albania page showing the Public Money Value that Political Parties have received in 10 years. 2011 – 2022. The data provided in the article disclose public funding from taxpayers’ money distributed to (51) Beneficiary Parties1), by Year abd by type of funding, i.e. annual or electoral funding, etc. The reference used for each data is…

Debate and Policy Paper on “Financial Control of State-Owned Corporates” (Standards, Chapter 32 of EU Integration)

The organization AIS, promoter of Open Data Albania, organized on May 31st, a Debate and Presentation of a Policy Paper on the topic of Financial Control of State-Owned Corporates (SOC – State Owned Corporates). Financial Control, as in chapter 32, part of Cluster 1, in the process of fulfilling the conditions and standards for Integration. State Owned Enterprises or Companies are a risky sector in…

DataThon Albania 2023 Youth Empowerment against Corruption

DataThon Albania, a data marathon, took place on April 3rd and 4th, 2023. Over two days, young participants collaborate to create a dataset, analyze, visualize, and present the data. AIS has previously organized events such as Hackathons, DataThons, or DiploHacks. This year, participants in the data marathon were young members of the OpenDataFellowship Network. The event aimed at Civic Education and empowering young people in…

AIS concerned: Central Election Commission has limited access to Documents and Information on previous Election Periods.

For many weeks now (February 2023), the CEC official website lost touch with its database before 2020. This database contains Documents, Acts, Reports, Minutes and Decisions that represent the backbone of CEC activity and electoral campaigns developments. Similarly, while Albania gears up for the local elections, the previous 2019 campaign is darkened by a total lack of acts and information on the CEC website. Although…

“February, Month of Civil Engagement for EU Integration” started – AIS presented a Policy Paper on Integrity Control of Public Contractors, EU practice and the Albanian Context

February, the Month of Civil Engagement for European Integration, began with an event of the Organization AIS, whose purpose was to present a Policy Paper titled “Control of the Integrity of Public Contractors, EU practices and contracting in the Albanian Context”, drafted in the frame of the C1-EU- NPA Project. His Excellency, the ambassador of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Tirana, Mr. Reinout Vos,…

StartUp Datathon Albania, Data Marathon by AIS, promoter of Open Data

AIS returns to its tradition of Datathon and Hackathon Albania. This November we started working with a group of young people for the DataThon that will be held in January 2023. DataThon comes from the words Data and Marathon. They are events where people meet to work together on an idea and to collect, analyze, visualize and communicate findings related to data. AIS has previously…

Treasury transactions, 10 years of open data for each expenditure, 1900 budgetary institutions

How does the Government Spend the Taxpayers’ Money? Our well-structured Treasury Transactions database enables the monitoring of all payments that state institutions make to third parties. Currently, we have data on each payment made in 10 years. The data is obtained through the access to information from the Treasury Department. They are placed in a system where anyone can easily find, use and reuse them…

Open Data and Gender Reports, Social-economic Data on Gender Balance

The Open Data Albania portal continuously publishes data related to Gender Balance Statistics in the country. Articles are listed under the Gender Relations topic. The latest data published are related to the gender balance in sectors and fields such as Demography, Education, Public Representation and Penal Policy by gender groups. The data assist in identifying ratios and development of gender groups, revealing also economic and social imbalances.…