Presentation of the 'Four Years of the National Minority Councils' Monitoring Report

The Provincial Protector of Citizens - Ombudsman (PPCO) presented its 'Four Years of the National Minority Councils' monitoring report on today's press conference.

Referring to its aims and the significance of monitoring the work of the national minority councils (NMCs), Aniko Muskinja Heinrich, the Provincial Ombudswoman, pointed out that it was clear right after the constitution of the NMCs back in 2010 that the implementation of the National Minority Councils Act would be a challenge.

' The PPCO found itself in a consulting role, being asked for advice, opinions and clarifications re. certain provisions of this Act. The PPCO decided, right at the beginning, that it would check the extent to which the local self-government units understood and comprehended this Act, whereas the NMCs were asked for information about the exercise of their jurisdiction,' said Muskinja Heinrich, stating also that the collaboration with the local self-governments and the NMCs was constant throughout the reporting period in order to find solutions for all the challenges. 'This is why, four years later, we have decided to summarize the entire work of the NMCs and to make these comprehensive data available to the public,' concluded the Ombudswoman.

Eva Vukasinovic, the National Minority Rights Deputy Ombudswoman, presented the results, conclusions and recommendations compiled in the Report, expressing a hope that after this year's elections the NMCs will have more initiative and use their authority set by the National Minority Councils Act to a much greater extent. She pointed out that some NMCs are not in a position to use all the authority provided to them by the Act, raising the issue whether the minority communities lacking capacities for implementation and providing for exercise of certain collective rights due to a low number of their members actually need such a broad set of authorities. Vukasinovic emphasized that the PPCO did the monitoring in order to get the position of the NMCs and use the feedback as guidelines concerning the future directions the amendments of the National Minority Act should take. Most of their feedback, however, concerned financing of the NMCs and not their authority and its exercise. She also underlined that during the Act amendment process the Constitutional provision that the level of already reached level of human and minority rights should not be decreased must be observed.

The latest monitoring was done in 2014 with an aim to analyze implementation of the National Minority Councils Act by the NMCs themselves during their 2010-2014 mandates. The report also provides information about the previous two monitoring rounds on the implementation of the Act by the local self-governments and NMCs during the first two years of their mandates.

Publication of the PPCO 'Four Years of the National Minority Councils' monitoring report was funded by the Open Society Fund in the Republic of Serbia.