Political control and oversight of the Government and other public office holders is a constitutionally stipulated function of the Assembly. To perform this function, oversight hearing is one mechanism to control the work of the Government, i.e. implementation of adopted laws and performance of officials and officers in the Government in executing legislative mandates. Oversight hearings provide the MPs with information and expert opinions about the work of the executive branch and state administration bodies. Even though this tool can provide the Assembly with relevant information about the work of the executive branch, it is still rarely used in practice.
On 13 November 2020, the Assembly of Republic of North Macedonia held an oversight hearing to deliberate the reasons and implemented laws in the procedure that led to the bankruptcy of Eurostandard Bank, as well as the enforcement of laws by competent institutions. Based on the Discourse Quality Index , the Institute for Democracy monitored the discourse quality during the oversight hearing, and assessed the positions that were taken and presented as well as the displayed behaviour by the participants in the discussion.
In general, the oversight hearing on the topic “Establishing the cause and enforcement of laws in the procedure that led to bankruptcy of Eurostandard Bank SC Skopje’’ was held in an appropriate atmosphere, without interruptions and restrictions, and with ensured attendance by all invited external participants, except for one. On the other hand, the quality of participants’ discourse is assessed as poor. Most of the MPs questioning was done in the form of promoting their own thesis or making accusations for the external participants, followed up by answers with poor argumentation by the invited witnesses and no detailed explanation. Participants in the discussion, in general, poorly supported their statements with arguments.
This analysis entails the results of the monitoring. First, it focuses on how oversight hearings are regulated in the Assembly of North Macedonia, followed by analysis of the discourse quality, behaviour of debate participants and how the debate developed throughout the oversight hearing.
Read the analysis here:
Quality of the discourse in the Assembly: Oversight hearing on the case of Eurostandard bank