UMWO and the government institutions together

Gender equality on local level

The Union of Macedonian Women Organizations in cooperation with the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy, the Department for Promotion of Gender Issues and 10 municipalities from Macedonia, and financially supported by the OSCE mission in the Republic of Macedonia, have started the implementation of the project “Promoting Gender Equality on Local Level”. The promotion took place on 12 January this year at the Parliamentary Club in Skopje, when the offices for support of the gender equality commission were opened. “This project will help us, the government, when opening a number of very important questions from the EU questionnaire for Macedonia, such as the religious, national and similar differences”, emphasized Aco Janevski, state secretary at the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy.

Geraldine Biallerstead, the person in charge of the gender issues at the OSCE mission in Macedonia, who is also a supporter of the project, emphasized that this organization has been financing such and similar projects for some time now. He added: Macedonia is a member of OSCE, and OSCE is a big donor of project related to gender issues. For the time being, this project will start functioning into ten municipalities with as many regional commissions on gender issues. However, we are not going to stop here, we will strive for such commissions to be set up in the other municipalities in Macedonia, we will help to complete and develop their capacity.” The project will be carried out in three phases. The first phase covers the institutional set-up of the commissions by establishing the commissions as permanent bodies within municipalities; the goal of the second phase is to raise the gender awareness by organizing seminars, workshops, promotional material and informative campaigns, whereas the third phase refers to establishment and work of the national network of gender equality commissions.

Savka Todorovska, UMWO president, said that this year they are expecting for the Law on gender equality to be passed which but contribute to the so far efforts of the organization.

 

D.M.