On May 26, during the parliamentary election campaign, the Human Resources Administration, for the needs of the Ministry of Capital Investments, announced a public competition for six General Directors of directorates within that government department. On this matter, certain remarks were made in the public sphere regarding the alleged lack of response from the Agency for Prevention of Corruption. These remarks are entirely legally unfounded.

It is not the Agency's role to approve or disapprove of employment practices in the final days of a government's mandate or to assess their appropriateness. The Agency's role is to respect and apply the law.

And we would like to remind that the Law on the Financing of Political Entities and Election Campaigns does not prescribe a ban on hiring during an election campaign to fill vacant positions provided for in the current rulebook on systematization, both for fixed-term and indefinite periods.

The Agency for Prevention of Corruption expressed its concerns about the legal shortcomings of that act, which leave room for various interpretations and possible abuses, as early as 2018. At that time, based on its experiences in implementing the law and expert opinions, the Agency defined 46 recommendations for its amendment. Of those, 21 were accepted, but a series of our suggestions that could have led to substantial improvements and addressed the deficiencies in the legal text, as well as aligning it with the Law on Misdemeanors and the Law on the Election of Councilors and Members of Parliament, were not adopted.

Committed to the principles of the rule of law, the Agency will continue to operate within the framework provided by the legislative framework and advocate for ways to improve it, highlighting the necessity of enacting a Law on Government that would address numerous existing legal gaps. However, the final decision depends on political will and lawmakers.