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Government also supported the non-governmental organizations

27 July 2011 / 16:07:53  GRReporter
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Over 100 million euro from the money of the Greek have sunk into the bottomless pockets of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) over the last 10 years, is the conclusion of the Transparency Committee in the  parliament, announced Zougla. After a detailed investigation into the financing of the non-profit organizations the Commission found that over the years large sums have been awarded for various causes, but little or nothing has been done as a result of these programs.

Representatives of the Association of Sworn Auditors have also been called for help, which after verification have recommended to stop all funding of non-governmental organizations, until all issues about their activities are clarified. Currently 195 programs are examined that have been opened in the period 2000-2010. The Commission defines the criteria for funding of various NGOs as vague, doubtful and dark. Moreover, no specific commitments for the control over the allocated funds or over the performance of the obligations under the respective programs of organizations. There is no answer as to why the non-governmental organizations expect funding from the government and why it was granted.

Now the findings of the Transparency Committee are examined by the prosecution and the Organization for supervision of public governance. They are expected to address the problem and to establish what exactly are the violations of the law so as to start a lawsuit for malpractice, where necessary.

The chaos in the activities of the non-governmental organizations in Greece is so great that after long investigation, the members of the parliamentary committee Thanassis Tsuras from PASOK and Yiannis Tragakis from New Democracy have literally given up from the situation. They have submitted all the information gathered to the authorities for final conclusions. One major problems is that there is no official public register of non-governmental organizations. Nor is there a specific organization to monitor their activities. There is also no uniform legal framework within which to be defined the limits and conditions under which NGOs should operate.

By April this year the new bill on the activities of voluntary organizations, which include non-governmental organizations had to be drafted. This commitment was made by the Government in February this year, but apparently the country's political developments and the economic hardships of the socialist government proved to be an obstacle to the fulfillment of the promise. The state is expected to tighten the supervision over the activities and funding of nonprofit organizations, which until yesterday were used to steal funds for social programs.

Tags: EconomySociety NGOs fraud funding
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