Readiness of people to control their Government
By Messenger Staff
Thursday, September 21
The PM made his remarks when Georgia officially became the chair of the Open Government Partnership for a year.
Kvirikashvili stated it is a great honor and privilege for Georgia to become the chairman of the OGP.
"In this process we have cooperated with many of you. We have shared your best experience and discussed our success stories together with interested people. I am impressed by the success that OGP member countries have reached around the world - I am excited by the readiness of the population to control their government,” declared the Georgian Prime Minister in New York.
“However, we have to learn a lot of lessons - not just from each other or civil society organizations, but from journalists, entrepreneurs and other leaders in the field of good governance," he added.
The OGP was launched in 2011 to provide an international platform for domestic reformers committed to making their governments more open, accountable, and responsive to citizens.
The Open Government Partnership formally launched on September 20, 2011, when the 8 founding governments (Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, Norway, the Philippines, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States) endorsed the Open Government Declaration, and announced their country action plans. Since 2011, OGP has welcomed the commitment of 67 additional governments to join the Partnership.
In total, 75 OGP participating countries and 15 subnational governments have made over 2,500 commitments to make their governments more open and accountable.
During its OGP chairmanship, Georgia’s strategic goals will be as follows:
To strengthen co-creation and citizen engagement;
To advance transparency and the fight against corruption;
To generate innovation in public service delivery;
To build better international partnerships.
It is one of the biggest proofs of a truly democratic society when people control their governments and make them meet the people’s demands.
Unfortunately, Georgia is not good at such things, as its past, years of nihilism and bad political culture discourages people from standing in the streets and protecting their rights.
It is positive that the country’s young generation is quite active in this regard, and there is hope in the future that Georgian people will manage to be engaged in civil activities.