NEWSLETTER No. 2

KRAGUJEVAC

News from Kragujevac civic sector - KG NGO NEWS – for the period from June - July  2002:

On 6 June 2002 The Alternative Circle organised a forum within the serial “Our stereotypes”, focused on prejudices against disabled women. On this occasion, Vasilija Rondovic, a multiple sclerosis patient spoke of her problems in communicating with the people in her environment.

The lecture "Investigation of public opinion and environment needs", officially opened the new programme of NGO MillenniuM - "PRactical Workshop" supported by the Netherlands Government. This educational programme on non-profit sector communication skills and management, focused on Kragujevac University students and young leaders of NGOs, democratic political parties and trade unions, consists of two modules with the total of 24 lectures, which will be presented to the participants by experts and practitioners from local, national and international organisations and institutions. A group of over thirty participants was first addressed by Nebojsa Krstic, Executive Board Information Officer of Kragujevac Municipal Assembly, which was followed by the above mentioned lecture before the attending media by Zoran Markovic, a sociologist and journalist from the PR Centre for the Development of Non-Profit Sector from Belgrade. For the first module, the lecturers were Zivka Vasilevska (CRNPS), Miroslav Marinkovic (G17 Plus), Rozalija Ilic (RIC & Tim Tri), Nemanja Krajcinovic and Zanka Panic (FCD), Radmila Radovic (European Perspective), Zarko Petrovic (YUCOM) and Olivera Bergam (Town Assembly). During the summer break, the workshop participants will be independently writing their project proposals, with the help of the skills acquired and in consultation with the organisation. The other, specialised part of the programme, is to be continued in October this year.

“Resistance” representatives decided to monitor the process of secondary school entrance examinations in Kragujevac, as invigilators, in order to insure its regularity.

On 7 June 2002 “School of Peace” organised local civil sector consulting activities on the occasion of preparing the Strategy for Poverty Decrease, made up by the Government of the Republic of Serbia, in cooperation with the international organisations UNDP and CRS programmes. The facilitator at the meeting was NGO “Sunce”.

NGO “Viktorija” started organising free preparatory matematics lessons for school entrance examinations, within the programme "I imagine, I create, I exist", supported by the Danish Council.

The Social Welfare Centre started the project "Aid to the Elderly" in their premises. Potential beneficiaries of this social and medical aid can be people over 65 years old. 

On 8 June 2002 the lecture of Dr Ljubomir Madzar and Dr Zoran Njegovan titled "Privatisation and problems in running socially-owned enterprises until the privatisation process finishes", in the big hall of “Dom Sindikata” building continued the implementation of the project of “Palgo Centre” from Belgrade - "Capacity building of local self-management institutions".

On 11 June 2002 at the meeting with the Town Assembly representatives, the German organisation GTZ announced the project of youth training among refugees and IDPs in the territory of Kragujevac, apart from the implementation of the technical cooperation programme.

On 12 June 2002 Town Board representatives from the League for Private Property and Human Rights Protection strongly protested because judicial authorities were not preventing illegal sale of nationalized facilities. The American non-governmental organisation ACDI/VOCA promoted the beginning of the implementation of the project "Community Revitalization through Democratic Action" in the media, in “Aerodrom” borough. One of the first projects chosen by the Community Board is the heating line reconstruction in Grada Karare Street, the total value of which is 1,360,000 dinars.

In the period from 13 – 15 June 2002, within the "Programme for local management reform in Serbia" implemented by the American organisation DAI, there was a workshop in Vrnjacka Banja titled "Strategy development for the improvement of relations between Kragujevac Municipality and its citizens", on which occasion the strategy was jointly developed by the representatives of the Town Assembly, media and local NGOs - NGO MillenniuM, RIC, Voice of Freedom, Alternative Circle and the NGO Face.

On 14 June 2002 there was a ceremony at the site of “Gruza” water supply system on the occasion of works finalization, where Ingolstadt, our twin city, invested about 315,000 euros. 

In the period form 14 – 16 June 2002 the NGO MillenniuM representatives gave lectures within the second module of the seminar in Banja Koviljaca within the project "Development of NGO sector in Macva Region", organised by NGO "Seoski Prag" from Sabac and supported by Freedom House.

On 17 June 2002 the first issue of NGO newsletter, within the programme "Promotion of pluralism by strengthening NGOs and the civil society in Serbia", was published  by regional partners, European Perspective and the European Commission.

On 21 June 2002 Partnership for Democratic Changes from Kragujevac organised a forum in the Youth Centre Gallery titled "Privatisation and social changes".  Dr Gordana Mitic opened the forum and Dr Miroslav Prokopijevic was a special guest .

On 24 June 2002 the NGO MillenniuM organised a forum at “Dom Sindikata” building, as a local partner of the Centre for Non-Violent Action from Belgrade, titled: "Four Views – From the past: What brought me to war?, Towards future: How to achieve permanent peace?", with participants Gordan Bodog from Zagreb, Adnan Hasanbegovic from Sarajevo and Nebojsa Jovanovic from Belgrade, who belonged to different parties once at war in the territory of former Yugoslavia. The programme was previously realised in Indjija, Nis and Novi Pazar, supported by the Switzerland Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Documentation Centre "Wars 1991-99" and the Association of War Invalids from Zemun Municipality, as well as locally supported by Kragujevac Town Assembly, Kragujevac Secretariat of Internal Affairs (SUP) and the local media. At the beginning of the forum, there was an attempt to cause an incident by the Association of War Invalids, which was efficiently prevented by SUP as well as   verbal conflicts between the host and some journalists. 

On 29 June 2002, by setting up an exhibition of documentary photographs from the forthcoming book "Urban Chronicle", as a constituent part of the programme, NGO MillenniuM contributed to the manifestation "Unexpected retro-dance" at the basketball playground in the town park, on the occasion of the twenty years of work anniversary of the radio host Stevan Pajic, organised by the radio station "First on the scale", supported by RTK, Kragujevac radio and TV station.

In the period from 29 – 30 June 2002 the first module of educational training was organised, titled "NGO and volunteer management" (lecturers Ivona Simic - DAI and David Goode) within the programme of Initiative for democracy and human rights titled "Promotion of pluralism by strengthening NGOs and the civil society in Serbia", which is being realised with the support of European Perspective and the European Commission.

2 July 2002 - "Life stories of Kragujevac women politicians" is the title of the new series of forums organised by the non-governmental organisation Alternative Circle. The guest at the first forum held at the small stage of Students Culture Centre (SKC), was Slavica Djukic Dejanovic, and on 11 July, Slavica Trifunovic, President of the local government Culture Department.

On 3 July 2002 within the project "From a town to a town", realised by the local authorities of twin towns  Kragujevac and Carrara in Italy, Home for parentless children "Mladost" in Kragujevac received eight computers and free training for its inmates. 

On 5 July 2002 the Students’ Association of Serbia announced the beginning of the campaign "Shake it up", aimed at expressing students’ revolt concerning the university enrolment policy, high tuitions and current trends in university reforms.

In the period from 5 – 6 July 2002 European Perspective organised the second module of educational training for the future trainers from partner organisations, titled "Participatory evaluation and monitoring" and " NGO marketing", with the following lecturers: Jasmina Kijevcanin - CRS and Momcilo Djordjevic – Faculty of Economics in Kragujevac, realised with the support of the European Commission.

10 July 2002 – The Town Assembly will commit 50 million dinars this year to renovation and reconstruction of school facilities in Kragujevac. In cooperation with ACDI/VOCA, the NGO Tango has started the project of establishing Kragujevac Women’s Business Club and Kragujevac Youth Business Club.

 In the period from 11 – 12 July 2002 the third module of educational training was organised, titled "Financial NGO management" and "Fundraising" (lecturers Zanka Panic and Nemanja Krajcinovic, Democracy Centre Fund, Belgrade), within the project "Promotion of pluralism by strengthening NGOs and the civil society in Serbia", realised by European Perspective, its partners and the European Commission.

On 15 July 2002 at the invitation of the Town Assembly Culture Department, NGO MillenniuM participated in the work of Culture Council and in the making of the strategy of Kragujevac culture policy, by producing the document "Third sector – new leader in culture policy".

On 16 July 2002 representatives of Kragujevac University, the American town of Springfield and the Romanian town Pitesti agreed on future cooperation. As the first step, a group of Springfield and Pitesti students and teachers will soon be visiting Kragujevac, and it is also stipulated for Kragujevac students to be guests at the universities of the two twin towns in America and Romania. The German Rector Conference will support the continuation of the project of academic computer network development at Kragujevac University by investing 50,000 euros more into the second phase of networking. The German Rector Conference donated 75,000 euros for the first phase of computer network development at Kragujevac University. The mayors of Kragujevac and Springfield, Dr Vlatko Rajkovic and Voren R. Kouplend, signed a charter, thus confirming the twinning of the two towns. The American town  Springfield from the State of Ohio had assisted Kragujevac several times before through donations and joint projects. The signing of the charter was attended by Kragujevac local government officials and representatives of the Embassy of the United States of America in Serbia and Montenegro.

In the period from 18 – 19 July 2002 the fourth module of educational seminar was organised, titled "Strategic planning and sustainability" (lecturer - Sanja Nikolin, CRS) realised by European Perspective and the European Commission.

Centre for the Development of Democratic Society is one of the 12 partner organisations that are included in the implementation of the project “Promotion of pluralism by strengthening NGOs and the civil society in Serbia” and has focused all its activities towards the realisation of this project. Members of this organisation spent most of June and July of the issuing year attending seminars that were made up of five modules with various topics from the domain of non-governmental sector. 

The seminars were very useful, and the programme encompassed experienced and successful non-governmental organisations with staff members engaged in non-governmental sector activities for many years. Even though the topics had long been familiar and addressed several times, a new light was cast on specific problems, most of all owing to some of the lecturers, which was useful for the network in general.

We wish to emphasize a highly important fact that the modules were attended by younger activists, some of whom encountered the addressed topics for the first time, which is of great significance for their further work in the non-governmental sector.

Apart from these activities, the focus of our attention have been certain party and non-party oriented manifestations, organised at the town level. One of the goals of the Centre for the Development of Democratic Society is support to culture events from various domains, bearing in mind that we are witnessing the marginalisation of this part of social life due to the overall situation in the country, and to insufficient presence of such programmes in the media.

The Centre has participated in book promotions and similar culture programmes in its earlier activities and will strive to continue with such events in the future as well. We wish to mention that GSS, the political party that supported the foundation of the Centre in 1998, has become increasingly focused on culture events, instead of dry campaigns ahead of us in this electoral year, and in that sense it has organised convenient receptions with lottery games, which had a lot of visitors, and the plan is to expand the action and turn it into a humanitarian-oriented activity.

In cooperation with the Students Culture Centre, the Centre is planning a summer exhibition of photographs for the following period with different subjects that would cover certain artists or groups of artists and with lecturers, highly specialised in the domains concerned. Depending on the needs of certain groups of beneficiaries and free terms, cooperation with amateur theatre groups is also possible and the proceeds would be used for humanitarian purposes. This would help continue the good tradition that NGO sector has had at the town level, especially through activities of the Open Club that has organised various courses, the guitar school, film projections and the like.

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