Workshops on Transparency in Public Administration

Workshops on Transparency in Public Administration
Dominican Republic, Santo Domingo 9/5/2011

EEmployees in the administrative and finance areas of the Office of Planning, the Judicial Consultation Office and the Department of Tenders and Contracts of the Ministry of Education (MINERD) took part in a workshop on The Transparency Project in the Public Administration in the Dominican Republic (TAP-DR in Spanish), given by Taide Aquino from the General Comptroller’s Office of the Republic under the auspices of the US Agency for International Development (USAID).

She referred to the Comptroller as an organization of internal control and to the articles and rules these mechanisms establish. She also analyzed the rules, laws, principles and objectives that make up this system within an institution.

Taide Aquino, a private consultant for the USAID, discussed the necessity to provide an effective internal control of resources within a company or institution in order to create reasonable security with respect to achieving the objectives of efficiency, efficacy and trustworthiness.

Ms. Aquino explained that the objective of the TAP-DR is to promote transparency in the administrative processes, supervision and to improve access to public administration, purchases made and contracts signed. She said that constant monitoring, information, communication and risk evaluation are necessary elements to achieve budget objectives, which can still be hidden, but that applied policies will provide alerts with respect to these procedures.

She referred to the Comptroller as an organization of internal control and to the articles and rules these mechanisms establish. She also analyzed the rules, laws, principles and objectives that make up this system within an institution.

The main goal of the workshop, she explained, is to improve the quality of corporate financial reports and to determine if internal controls are being managed efficiently.

In addition, Aquino spoke about management policies and practices in evaluating institutional risk. She detailed the components of the internal control process that include the environment, advanced managerial methods applied in the United States, ethical and public integrity, administrative philosophy and style, structural organization, delegation of authority, adhesion to specific applicable institutional policies and documentation of processes and systems.

Those attending the workshop included Luis Jesús Ennar Dorado, Financial Director General; William Sifres, Director General of School Buildings; Salvador López, of the Accounting Office; Ana Ceballos Rodríguez, of the Treasury Department; Julio Vólquez, from the Office of Human Resources; Betty Céspedes Torres, from the Auditing Unit; Lisette Rodríguez, from the National Planning Office; Pedro Madé Geraldo, Carmen Reyes and Rita Serrano, from the Judicial Consulting Department. Also present were Claudia Tejada, specialist in bids and tenders from the Department if Purchasing and Contracts and Henry Núñez, of Free Access to Information.

Taide Aquino, giving the workshop on internal control and transparency in public administration at the Ministry of Education.