Public discussion on the Law on Civil Associations and Foundations

Organizations of public interest – greatest novelty

On 2 March 2005 at the Parliamentary Club in Skopje, The Macedonian Centre for International Cooperation, the Ministry of Justice and the International Centre for Nonprofit Law (ICNL) organized a public discussion on the working version of proposal-changes and the amendments of the Law for Civil Associations and Foundations.

“Today’s meeting, that is the final phase of the discussion on the changes and amendments of the Law for Civil Associations and Foundations, is an example of a model how to pass such laws in future – with an active involvement of civil society organizations, ministries and governmental institutions, national and foreign experts, all together”, said Saso Klekovski, executive director of MCIC. One novelty is that according to the proposed law the physical and legal entities will be put on equal basis, as well as the domestic and foreign individuals in establishing CSOs, that will also be able to perform economic activities, and the new category – organizations of public interest is being introduced.

Meri Mladenovska – Gorgievska, Minister of Justice said: “We are working on an important law which is part of every developed countries democracy, a law that is to strengthen the democratic principles. The Law on CSO was passed in 1998 and it filled a gap in this area, and with the necessary qualification of certain parts of it, thanks to all parties involved, we are hoping that its changes will become official before the given deadline”

“The main emphasis in the changes was placed upon the economic activities of the CSOs and we emphasized the status of the organizations of public interest. Another novelty is the right to establish CSOs will be also given to the legal entities and not only to the physical ones. Besides a managerial board, the CSOs are obliged to provide a supervisory committee within their structure”, explained Dr. Borce Davitkovski.

Davitkovski is the author of the Law for Civic Associations and Foundations and he is also the author of the proposal-changes of the Law, together with Dr. Natasa Gaber – Damjanovska.

“The selection of an organization of public interest will be made by a national commission, financed from the national budget and established by the government. It will be an independent body, consisting of seven members – 1 member from the Ministry of Justice (permanently), 3 rotating members from the other ministries and 3 experts from the civic sector with a five-year mandate. The country will provide tax alleviations for these associations, they will have certain privileges and the possibility to get certain assets from the budget, explained the author Gaber-Damjanovska. Various civic associations and foundation and other interested individuals took part in the discussion. They were given the opportunity to comment on the draft-version of the proposal-changes and the amendments of the Law before it is delivered to the Government of the Republic of Macedonia. The proposal-changes can be found on www.graganskisvet.org.mk

 

D.M.