Civil society expresses its regret at the non-adoption of the package of laws on gender equality, which has been discussed since 2012. The package was approved by the Government and was submitted to Parliament this May. “Votes can be found when the party leaders make effort. Regretfully, no effort is made with respect to the package of laws on gender equality,” the executive director of the Partnership for Development Center Alexei Buzu said in a news conference at IPN.
The Government’s bill provides for the introduction of a minimum women’s political representation quota of 40%. There are also two bills put forward by groups of MPs. The Liberal-Democrats’ bill stipulates a minimum quota of 30%, while the Democrats’ bill – of 50%. “We were to have a discussion with the competent commission that was to endorse the bill, but the meeting was postponed as Parliament ratified the Association Agreement with the EU that day. Unfortunately, no meeting has been held until now. We think this is a sign of gross irresponsibility on the part of the party leaders,” said Alexei Buzu, adding that civil society is yet hopeful that the government will adopt the given package of laws by the end of the current parliamentary session.
Andrei Brighidin, development, monitoring and assessment director at East Europe Foundation, made reference to another commitment of the government, namely the implementation of the mechanism for strengthening the financial sustainability of civil society. “This commitment was undertaken when the government adopted the civil society development strategy for 2012-2014. In 2013, there were to be finalized the legislative aspects and the mechanism was to become a reality in 2014. The taxpayers were to transfer 2% of the income tax to public utility NGOs. This mechanism was to increase the interaction between NGOs and communities and to lead to the implementation of new services,” stated Andrei Brighidin.
He noted that even if a working group was created under the Ministry of Finance, which worked out the bills needed to implement the mechanism, its work was ignored. “There was proposed another bill to amend legal acts. From our viewpoint, this bill has a number of shortcomings. It differentiates between nongovernmental organizations and religious organizations that are also to benefit from 2% of the income tax paid by taxpayers. We have nothing against the religious organizations. The main aspect that must be taken into account is the fact that the NGOs will go through a filer and will have to obtain a public utility certificate, while the regions organizations will automatically benefit from these mechanisms,” said Andrei Brighidin.
According to him, the bill also contains defective provisions concerning confidentiality and the monitoring of the use of public money. Civil society hopes that they will be eliminated.
