Corruption in Macedonian Advertising Hard to Prove

The head of Macedonia's anti-corruption commission, Ilmi Selami, said it was not possible to prove that the government was guilty of corruption when it came to handing out contracts to agencies for government campaigns.

“Our hands are tied,” Selami said.

Earlier this month, the government was accused of continuing to spend millions of euros on selected marketing agencies that make adverts for its projects and campaigns.

The pro-opposition A1 TV station disclosed that in January alone, the centre-right government of Nikola Gruevski ordered 513,000 euros' worth of commercials from one marketing agency, “Republika”.

The TV station said this agency appeared to be a government favourite, along with two others, “In Marketing” and “Market Vision”.

Official records on public procurement showed that these agencies together received more than 6 million euros from the government for paid work in the period 2008-2010.

Selami said that the Commission had no way of measuring the quality of the paid adverts and thus could not determine whether corrupt practices had occurred, although it was obvious that certain agencies appeared as contractors very often.

The named agencies have been engaged in various campaigns, such as anti-smoking, encouraging Macedonians to explore their own country and a campaign in favour of “optimism and respect of good values”.

“The choice of marketing agencies is done in accordance with the Public Procurement Law” the government said, reacting to the A1 report. The government denied giving the three agencies any privileges, saying it had signed many contracts with others as well.

The issue became a hot topic in 2009 when the state auditors revealed that the VMRO DPMNE-led government had spent over 10 million euros on campaigns and commercials in the previous year, 2008.