Political will, as well as a renewed and better dialogue with civic organizations

Center Amalipe and Friedrich Ebert Foundation organized a high-level forum “Policies for equality, inclusion and participation of Roma: an investment in a better future for Bulgaria” on February 15, 2022. The online Forum was attended by Deputy Prime Minister Kalina Konstantinova, MPs from the six main parliamentary groups (excluding Vazrazhdane, who were deliberately excluded from the event as part of Amalipe policy of not working with anti-Roma and anti-European parties), representatives of the European Commission, ambassadors and diplomats, the Ombudsman of the Republic of Bulgaria Diana Kovacheva, the Chair of the Commission for Protection against Discrimination Anna Dzhumalieva, the Managing authorities of ESF operational programs, Roma and pro-Roma NGOs. What have we discussed and what decisions united us? 

The online discussion was organized to present the analysis “Implementation of the National Strategy for Roma Integration” and the report “Concept for the new National Strategy for the Equality, Inclusion and Participation of Roma”, prepared by Amalipe Center, World Without Borders, New Road and the Friedrich Ebert Foundation. You can read both reports here. At the beginning of the forum Alexey Pamporov presented the report “Some monitoring notes on the implementation of the Roma Integration Strategy (2012-2020)”. Deyan Kolev presented the Concept for the new National Strategy, clarifying that it is the result of a consensus among many Roma organizations. He also clarified that its main ideas had been submitted in one way or another during the previous year throughout the process of drafting the new strategic document. Some of these proposals have been adopted and integrated into the strategy, but another important part has been formally / unsatisfactorily included or not included at all. Due to the constant pre-election period last year, the consultative process for drafting the new strategy was only at the administrative and not at the political level and most of the Roma organizations did not participate in it, Kolev stressed. Therefore, it is necessary to quickly discuss and include other proposals of Roma organizations.

Due to the forthcoming approval of the new National Strategy for Roma Inclusion and Participation, and the lack of political debate among stakeholders in recent months, the discussion quickly focused on what strategy and action plan are needed.
Complementing the latest draft of the strategy with priorities such as “Equality before the law / Combating anti-Roma discrimination”, “Roma participation”, “Roma women” and developing applications with specific measures to combat anti-Roma discrimination, segregation in education and anti-Roma stereotypes, and adopting the Strategy through decision of the National Assembly (after being adopted by the Council of Ministers), were the main points on which most of the participants united. The idea of ​​the new Roma strategy to be considered and voted in the National Assembly met with the support of all parliamentary groups, and was explicitly supported by the Ombudsman Diana Kovacheva and the Chair of the Commission for Protection against Discrimination Assoc. Prof. Dr. Dzhumalieva. She also met with the support of ambassadors and representatives of the European Commission (from DG Justice and DG Employment). There was a general desire for the new Strategy and the Action Plan to be working documents, supported by the necessary funding and responsibilities of the relevant institutions.
The high-level participation from the European Commission underlined once again the importance of the strategy and the process of its preparation for the international partners, and especially for the ESF. Mr. Szabolcs Schmidt pointed that the deadline for approving the national strategies was end of September 2021. So Bulgarian strategy is anticipated by th end of March, the latest. The European Commission will assess the strategies sumbitted and will prepare recommendations until the end of the year. The latter will be based also on the monitoring prepared with the European initiative Roma Civil Monitoring.Mr. Jeroen Jutte from DG Employment stressed that the adoption of the national Strategy is a conditionality for the opening of the ESF funding for the country.

During the intensive discussion, moderated by Irina Nedeva, journalist at the Bulgarian National Radio and Chair of the Asocciation of the European Journalists in Bulgaria, the participants made many specific suggestions. You can see the entire discussion on  Amalipe Center Facebook page.

A summary of the keynote speeches and suggestions made during the Forum will be uploaded on Amalipe Center website.
The event is organized together with:

See also: