Representatives of the Public Association “Solidary Parents” and of the civic initiative “Alternative City Hall”, together with parents and children, mounted a protest in front of the Chisinau City Hall. The protesters demanded that the municipality should restore the free group with extended hours for primary school students, IPN reports.
According to the executive director of “Solidary Parents” Ala Revenco, the children have the right to attend groups with prolonged hours free of charge. But decisions at municipal level are taken unilaterally by the mayor general. “These decisions started to have an obvious tinge against children. I don’t know why mayor Ion Ceban considered that the children are the first on whose account we can save public money, to have it for concerts, trips abroad, etc.,” said Ala Revenco.
According to her, through the protest the parents want to convince the municipality to allocate money for groups with extended hours in schools, while primary school students should be able to attend them free of charge. “Information that the group with extended hours is proposed, but with payment began to be circulated through schools, at meetings with parents. What the Chisinau City Hall proposes, and should be ashamed of, is not only that we, as parents, should cover these expenses of the City Hall, but in fact they want to double or even triple them,” stated the director of the association.
“We, as parents, cannot accept such a situation and obviously took to the streets today and demand that the groups with extended hours be restored. The money belongs to all of us, citizens of this city. Those who are here – we all contribute to the formation of the budget and the mayor must ask us what we want to spend this money on – sidewalks, benches in the park or the group with extended hours or on shift groups in kindergartens, which already work only by 5 p.m.” said Ala Revenco.
The participants in the protest chanted “Restore the groups with free extended hours!”, “Shame!”, “Shame, Ion Ceban!”, “Return the children’s money!” etc. Also, the demonstrators fixed several messages on the walls of the City Hall, including: “It is an irresponsible and discriminatory decision towards primary school children and their parents. The safety of children is made subordinate to Mister Ceban’s lavish concerts.”
The Chisinau City Hall has not yet come up with a reaction over the protest.
