Taking part in a round table discussion, organised by his ministry, the government's office for nongovernmental organisations, the NGO GONG and Transparency International in Zagreb, Minister Simonovic said that the anti-corruption action plan had already given first results, including anti-graft trials in tertiary education ("Index" case), in the land registry system (the "Gruntovnica" case) and in the business and government sectors (the "Maestro" trial for corruption at the Croatian Privatisation Fund).
All this is encouraging, Simonovic said admitting that there still existed a high corruption perception.
It is necessary to continue carrying out anti-corruption measures "with very clear principles: nobody is above the law," he said.
The head of the national council monitoring the implementation of the anti-corruption strategy, Zeljko Jovanovic, said the anti-corruption action plan had been carried out, but that results such as the restoration of confidence in the system and a higher number of verdicts were still missing.
Jovanovic holds that a new action plan should be drafted for the next year, urging greater political will to complete the ongoing reform in the judiciary.
GONG president Sandra Pernar agreed that a relevant report read that a majority of measures from the action plan had been carried out, but that it was not evident how much those measures were successful.
The leader of Transparency International Croatia, Zorislav Antun Petrovic, said that transparency in the work of public administration was increasing and that the number of legal loopholes was being reduced.