Putting the spotlight on the employment of young Kosovo Roma, Ashkali and Egyptians

Erxhan Galushi and Emel Qehaja are two of the eight interns who recently started an internship with the OSCE Mission in Kosovo as a part of a project to help young Roma, Ashkali and Egyptians find long-term employment and integrate in the societies they live in. They will spend five months working at the Mission and another five in selected ministries in Kosovo to improve their professional skills and future prospects for employment.

The project, Best Practices for Roma Integration, financed by the European Union and implemented by the OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), is offering similar opportunities to 25 young people from these minorities throughout South-Eastern Europe.*

Overcoming under-representation

According to legislation, non-Albanian communities in Kosovo should account for at least 10 per cent of civil servants at the central level, while at the municipal level their numbers should be proportionate to local demographics.

However, a recent report by the OSCE Mission notes with particular concern “the persistent and disproportionate under-representation of Kosovo Roma, Kosovo Ashkali and Kosovo Egyptian communities at all levels of the civil service”. In Gračanica/Graçanicë, for example, Kosovo Roma make up 6.98 per cent of the population, but none of them are working in the civil service, and in Gjakovë/Ðakovica the Kosovo Egyptian community makes up 5.41 per cent of the population, but they account for only 1.28 per cent of positions in the civil service.  

Kosovo institutions, as noted in the Strategy for the Integration of Roma, Ashkali and Egyptian Communities in Kosovo, are aware of these shortfalls and blame the situation on the low level of education and professional training among the relevant communities.

The OSCE is working to overcome this through the development of professional skills and a number of other activities to assist governmental institutions in developing and implementing strategies and action plans to integrate Kosovo Roma, Ashkali, and Egyptian communities into society.

A young professional with a mission

Erxhan, a law student from Prizren, has been placed in the OSCE Mission’s Central Assembly and Independent Institutions Section, which monitors and supports the work of various committees at the Assembly of Kosovo.

He says that the opportunity to do an internship at the very place where Kosovo’s laws are made could not have come at a better time. “It has given me an opportunity to see how laws are actually made. This is the kind of experience I need to get a job in a governmental institution.”

By the time he graduates from the Faculty of Law at Prishtine/Pristina University in June, he will already have drafted reports on how the committees for Labor and Social Welfare, Human Rights and Gender Equality, and the Rights and Interests of Communities and Returns complied with rules of procedure and human rights standards.

Education is key

Emel, an Information Technology student at the Faculty of Education in Gjakovë/Ðakovica, believes that the best way for her to make a valuable contribution to her community is through teaching. Though still a student, sharing what she has learned is nothing new for Emel. For example, she spent two years running her own show on Radio Gjakova about the importance of health care for women and children.

Now, Emel is doing an internship with the OSCE’s Communities Team in Prizren, which maintains contact with ethnic communities and advises municipal institutions on how to best address their needs.

“I have gained a deeper insight into the wide array of issues that Roma, Ashkali and Egyptian communities are facing,” says Emel. “Education is not the only area where there are problems: there are serious issues with employment, participation in public life, and sometimes even discrimination.”

Emel notes that education is key and that more needs to be done to reach out to families and to talk to them about the importance of education in the battle for equality: “I hope that I will eventually get to work with the municipal office for returns and communities in my hometown of Gjakovë and that I will be able to reach out to my community and create a link with the municipality that will lead to their greater engagement in creating vocational training and employment opportunities. After all, there are many well-educated Roma, Ashkali, and Egyptians, and they just need an opportunity to prove themselves.”

*This regional initiative is being implemented in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia. For more information, visit the Best Practices for Roma Intergration project website.