Directors and authorized persons of 36 public enterprises from all regions of the country signed the Declaration on anti-corruption practices and policies in public enterprises, which concluded the one-year project "Encouraging an enabling environment for reporting corruption in public enterprises", which was carried out by the Institute for Strategic Research and Education (ISIE), with the support of the US Embassy in Skopje.

With the Declaration, the directors expressed their commitment to foster a culture of integrity, transparency and accountability of public enterprises.

- Recognizing the harmful impact of corruption on our economy, society and the reputation of our state and local community, as well as the need to protect the public interest through the activities we carry out, we undertake to respect the highest standards of ethical behavior and we fight against corruption in all its forms - it is stated in the Declaration.

According to the project manager Professor Misha Dokmanović, the basic conclusion of the study is that public enterprises move at different speeds when it comes to the fight against corruption, some partially fulfill and others not their legal obligations.

- Macedonia has many laws to fight corruption, but there is no political will for their full implementation, but this project is the first step that expresses the willingness of the leaders to deal with this evil - Dokmanovic added.

According to Eric Meyer, Deputy Chief of Mission of the US Embassy, ​​the perception of corruption as a disease is not good.

– You can be a little sick, but not a little corrupt, corruption is an evil that corrupts the pillars of society. Hence, it depends on Macedonian citizens whether they will stop tolerating institutional corruption at all levels - Meyer pointed out.

 Only three PEs received reports of corruption from whistleblowers?!

The number of reports received, as well as the number of enterprises that received reports, shows that the concept of whistleblowers is at a low level of implementation. The very fact that only three public companies received reports in the three-year period of analysis is illogical considering that according to a large number of analyzes and reports, the degree of corruption in the Republic of Macedonia is at a relatively high level.

Hence the question arises why the number of applications is low? Namely, one explanation is that there is no trust in the institutions (in this case public enterprises) that the report will be acted upon appropriately, another explanation is that potential whistleblowers are not familiar with this mechanism, while a third explanation would be that potential whistleblowers are afraid to report , due to possible future consequences.