New government department aims to have Romanian public administration information website up and running in March

The online provision of information and services from Romania's government will be united under a single department. With a new department in place, data from different institutions will be integrated and offered online at the end of March, according to the government. The new department will have with 30 employees, but will call on some employees already working in the IT department of the executive. “We aim to have around 15 people in this department, plus another 15 people to build the website and so on, basically to be built properly,” said Radu Puchiu, an adviser to the Romanian PM. The move aims to bring greater transparency to Romanian public administration and the online information will also include details of the selection processes for public officials as well as the salaries they receive. The total number of employees - officials, civil servants and contracted staff - will also be on the website. The government is hoping to have at least some parts of the website up and running before the end of March. The whole project will also include an online project that was set up last year and taken over by the Romanian GThe Government. Romanian PhD candidate Cristian Botan (25), who created an online platform aiming to bring more transparency into the state hiring process, was appointed by PM Victor Ponta as counselor for transparency in public administration in December 2012. “Not only did Cristian Botan draw our attention to one of sorest points of the system, but he also devised a solution to cure it: an online platform that brings transparency to the system,” according to Prime Minister Ponta. The platform developed by Cristian Botan features job announcements from all state institutions, as published in the Romanian Official Journal. According to Botan’s own proposals for an improvement of the current hiring process, vacancies should be announced in the Official Romanian Journal at least 10 days before application deadlines, while candidates’ family relations with prospective employers within the State system should be disclosed and a public archive of State employees should be available for consultation at all times. Among the objectives of the government program for the period 2013-2016 is meeting the European Open Data Initiative - making public data available, reusable and redistributable freely, regardless of the type of copyright restrictions, patents or other controls (open data). Ioana Toader, ioana.toader@romania-insider.com