Institute for Development of Freedom of Information (IDFI) together with Ilia State University is implementing the Certified Program on Fighting Corruption. The program consists of 8 modules and aims to raise the awareness and support development of the program participants, as active individuals in combating corruption.

On December 19, the graduation ceremony of the second module of the program – Good Governance – was held.

Within the Good Governance module, program participants studied various topics such as: freedom of information and its proactive publishing, the definition of public service and public good and the attitude of the citizens towards it, the challenges of the procurement, decentralization, Open Governance Partnership (OGP) and the transparency of archives.

Unlike other modules, the Good Governance module was conducted by several invited speakers. The first lecture, conducted by the public service expert – Andro Gigauri, was dedicated to introducing public good, its actual meaning and the necessity of its protection.  The second lecture, conducted by Levan Avalishvili, Programs Director of IDFI, was focused on freedom of information and proactive publishing. Mr. Avalishvili shared a  huge experience of IDFI regarding the terms of requesting, processing and analyzing public information, he had also introduced advocacy methods that are actively used in the process of legislation on access to public information.

On November 12, as part of the third lecture of the module, independent expert of the procurement, David Marghania shared the challenges and achievements of procurement to the program participants, regarding Ukraine, Georgia and other countries.

The fourth lecture of the program was focused on decentralization where David Losaberidze, expert on local governments, presented the conception on strengthening the local governments, delegation of public services to local authorities and the importance of the electronic services in fighting corruption, to the program participants.

The fifth and sixth lecture of the Good Governance module was headed by the IDFI Director and member of the OGP Board, Giorgi Kldiashvili. Particularly, Giorgi Kldiashvili highlighted spoke on the importance of the OGP, the significance of active involvement of Georgia in OGP, and on the role of the Parliament of Georgia in implementing the principles of the open parliament. OGP is the international platform where the member states can voluntarily take the commitments regarding better transparency, fighting corruption and delivering public services using electronic means.

The last lecture of the Good Governance module was concentrated on the transparency and further studies of the soviet archives. Without researching the totalitarian past and analyzing the fatal mistakes done by the State, it is impossible to create the effective and open governance system. Giorgi Kldiashvili discussed the works done by IDFI to increase the transparency of Archives, concentrated on the challenges of this sphere and presented its possible solutions.

The award ceremony of Good Governance Module took place on December 19, 2019.

The Program in Fighting Corruption will be continued from January 26, 2020, with the Legal Side of Corruption module.

The Educational Certification Program on Fighting Corruption, has started on October 8 and there 6 more modules left for participants until the course will be finished. The Program is financially supported by the Open Society Foundations with co-funding from the Open Society Georgia Foundation.  

Levan Avalishvili is speaking about the theoretical knowledge and practical experience which the participants, of his educational Module, will receive.