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GPKT Meeting Report 14

Youth Working Group Meeting

10 December 2004 / Gjilan/Gnjilane

Rationale

On the basis of the conclusions reached at the GPKT Kumanovo Conference (September 2004), a next steps meeting of the Youth Working Group was held on December 10, 2004, hosted by the OSCE in Gjilan/Gnjilane to further elaborate the idea of establishing a GPKT Youth Council, and to discuss possible activities to be undertaken jointly in the micro-region.

An additional reason for scheduling the Youth Working Group meeting on the 10th December in Gjilan / Gnjilane was so that following the meeting, participants would have the opportunity to attend the Gjilan / Gnjilane Youth Day multi-cultural programme planned by the Gjilan / Gnjilane Youth Assembly and the OSCE for the evening of the 10th December, in the Gjilan / Gnjilane Cinema.

Summary of Discussion at the Kumanovo conference, September 2004

During the Kumanovo Conference Youth Working Group session, one of the main points from the discussion was the strong support from participants for establishing a more structured form of co-operation between GPKT youth to facilitate cross-border activities. The formation of a GPKT Youth Council was seen as being the optimal mechanism for the implementation of various key activities, and the following possible areas of engagement were identified:
Empowerment of youth through capacity building, including training of trainers,
Wider outreach training in mediation skills (changing mind-sets),
Joint advocacy vis-à-vis local and national governments on priority issues including ensuring better representation of youth in decision-making processes on relevant social issues.

Additional proposals included suggestions for concrete activities such as:
Awareness-raising and public information campaigns against drug use and HIV/AIDS prevention.
The organisation of youth camps, festivals, fairs, exhibitions and other joint events.
Increased networking between youth and education NGOs and educational institutions.

In conclusion, participants agreed on the next step of working to establish a cross-border GPKT Youth Council. It was agreed that a meeting to clarify further organisational and participatory issues will be held within the framework of EWI’s Youth GPKT Working Group, and that all relevant NGO’s and youth groups will be invited to discuss taking forward the establishment of a youth council for the micro-region. The meeting will also look at finalising the composition of the council, and will discuss the suggestion made during the workshop to also establish a supporting Advisory Board.
 

Discussion and Conclusions

The meeting began with introduction of all participants, and a warm welcome was given to the three youth representatives participating from Trgoviste, the ‘new’ municipality in the GPKT micro-region – this meeting in Gjilan / Gnjilane was the first Youth Working Group meeting with Trgoviste participation.

Establishment of the GPKT Youth Council

Discussion followed on the main conclusion of the last meeting of the Youth Working Group, at the Youth session during the Kumanovo Conference: the need to establish a more consolidated form of the Working Group, a GPKT Youth Council, in order to facilitate the implementation of concrete activities.

All participants were strongly in favour of the establishment of a Youth Council for the micro-region. Several aspects of the Council were discussed, including its objectives and role.

Participants felt the Council should focus on:
Building relationships between the youth of the four municipalities
Solving joint problems through joint activities
Developing the capacity of the participants, including through sharing experience between the more experienced youth activists and groups involved
Playing a role within the four municipalities, and advocacy both at local and central government levels

With this, and possible structures for the Council in mind, participants discussed how co-ordination and ‘membership’ of the Council would work. Three key points were made:
Membership of the Council should kept open for more youth to join and get involved if they wanted, particularly on specific activities
A co-ordination committee of some kind would be helpful, but membership should be wider and divided into sub-groups working on different topics
A system of contact points to ensure good communication throughout the Council and its members was necessary.

It was also agreed that the Council’s structure should grow and develop as activities and the Council itself progressed. To create a basic structure to move forward with, participants split into three groups which came up with three proposals for structures. These three structures were presented, and participants then voted to decide which was most appropriate.

The final agreement was a combination of two similar proposals, and comprised a largely activity-based structure, with sub-groups focussing on specific activities such as sport, culture, etc.:

GPKT Youth Council First Step Structure

In order to facilitate communication and information-sharing, a system of contact points for the Youth Council was also established – representatives from each municipality that would take responsibility for informing all the other Youth Council members in their municipality about upcoming meetings, trainings and activities. The following contact points were elected:

Gjilan / Gnjilane
Besim Salihu, gjilaniyouthnet@yahoo.com, +377 (0) 44 369 563 / +381 (0) 28 20 750
Edona Daku, edona_444@hotmail.com, +381 (0) 28 24 115

Presevo
Arta Dalipi, artushja_87@hotmail.com, +381 (0) 63 858 1473
Betim Shabani, B_shabani@hotmail.com
+381 (0) 17 660 905

Kumanovo
Darko Rusevski, rusevski@yahoo.com
+389 (0) 31 425 298 / +389 (0) 71 624 374
Adnan Qaili, adi_gugi@hotmail.com
+389 (0) 70 912 177

Trgoviste
Davor Mitrovic, +381 (0) 64 23 34 328

A presentation was also made about the project proposal submitted by the Gjilan / Gnjilane Youth Centre to the Council of Europe for the development of the GPKT Youth Council. Aferdita Syla outlined the capacity development and network consolidation activities she hoped to be able to implement if support for their project was approved. This was an excellent example of a first move towards self-sustainability of the Youth Council and cross-border youth initiatives in the GPKT region.


Activities

Discussion then moved to the identification of specific activities that the Youth Council would aim to implement.

First discussed was a proposal by IPK, whose volunteers had approached EWI following the Kumanovo conference, with the suggestion that the ongoing ‘Time Out’ multi-lingual youth magazine/newsletter, written by youth volunteers in Kumanovo and Lipkovo, could be taken up as a project for the micro-region. IPK and EWI had met several times before the Youth Working Group meeting in order to prepare a feasibility study for the costs of a pilot project of a ‘GPKT Time Out’ style newsletter, and IPK representatives Edita Ajdini and Maurits van Heek presented the joint IPK-EWI proposal for a pilot phase of 3 bi-monthly issues, including training and mentoring for youth journalists from all four municipalities. All participants were strongly in favour of implementing this activity, and most of those present ‘signed up’ to take part in the first co-ordination meeting for the project in later January 2005.

The second activity proposed by Stefan Manevski from Kumanovo was to organise a Model UN debate forum in GPKT. Participants supported this idea, and it was recognised that although the working language of such a forum could be English, translation support would need to be provided for non-English speaking participants so that everyone who wanted could be included. It was agreed that all those who were interested in the idea would exchange ideas with Stefan before the next GPKT Youth Council meeting in January, where more defined proposals for Model UN forum activities would be presented and discussed.

The third activity proposed by Frosina Tasevska from Kumanovo was to undertake cultural exchange summer camps or similar activities, with the objective of participants and youth in the micro-region learning more and understanding more about each other’s culture – a proposal which everyone agreed with. Although the point was made that for more costly activities such as residential summer camps, funding proposals would have to be developed, participants were very much in favour of planning specific events and working on fund-raising for larger-scale activities. It was decided that Frosina would be the focal point for this activity area, and all those interested in developing ideas for activities would contact her in the next two months, and consolidate ideas which would be presented for discussion at the next GPKT Youth Council meeting in January.

A fourth activity proposed by Valon Hajrullahu from Gjilan / Gnjilane was to have some kind of sport-focussed activity for the Youth Council, as this would be an good way to bring youth together for events that could help to develop relationships in a fun way. Participants supported this proposal, and as with the other activity areas, it was decided that Valon would act as a focal point for sports activity suggestions, which would be combined and presented at the next meeting of the Council.

A last area of activity was proposed by Lindita Ajdini from Kumanovo, who suggested that art projects could be a great way to bring people together in a creative way. This proposal also had support from the participants, and it was agreed that Lindita would act as the contact point for ideas for art-related activities to be presented at the next meeting of the Council.

Chrissie Hirst from EWI then took the opportunity to give a brief explanation of the EWI / SEE Change cross-border micro-grant funding opportunity, explaining that this could offer a way to get the funding support necessary for implementation of some of these ideas. She explained the process in brief, the need for partners and assessment of all applications on their merit, and noted the deadline of 10th February 2005 for applications.

Finally, it was agreed that the next meeting of the GPKT Youth Council would be on Saturday 15 January 2005 in Kumanovo. Although some of the youth representatives from Gjilan / Gnjilane did not have passports, it was agreed that they would apply to UNMIK for these before the meeting to ensure they could attend, and to make it possible for them to travel to events around the micro-region from then on.
 

Other activities at the meeting

Lunch during the meeting day was held at the Lura restaurant, where the Catholic Relief Services cross-border co-operation project (Kumanovo and Gjilan / Gnjilane) was holding the presentation of a cross-border artwork, a painting of cross-border co-operation by two artists from Kumanovo and Gjilan / Gnjilane, to the Mayor of Gjilan / Gnjilane. The Youth Council members were able to meet and chat with representatives of the CRS working groups present, and one of the CRS representatives joined the GPKT Youth Council after lunch for the remainder of the meeting.

Participants also completed training needs questionnaires at the meeting, and on the basis of these, around twenty will be selected and invited to attend a project skills training seminar on 16th and 17th December 2004 in Gjilan / Gnjilane.

OSCE Youth Day Cultural Programme

Following the meeting, the members of the Youth Council were invited to stay on to attend the cultural programme organised by the Gjilan / Gnjilane Youth Assembly with the support of the OSCE, as part of a ‘Youth Day’ of activities in the town.

EWI had contributed to the organisation of this programme by arranging and supporting a performance of a multi-ethnic choir from Kumanovo. Many members of the GPKT Youth Council from Presevo, Kumanovo and Trgoviste stayed on to join in the evening’s programme, and their attendance in the audience was warmly welcomed and applauded. Various members of other GPKT Working Groups (Education, Women’s and Media Groups) also attended the programme, which moved on from choir and classical music pieces to later break-dance and rock band performances later in the evening.

There was also a significant amount of press interest in the event, and in the GPKT Youth Council, and several local (and not so local) media houses reported on the event. The GPKT Local Project Co-ordinator was interviewed by TV Vali and Audiovisija Produkcija (to be broadcast in Mitrovica, by TV Hertz in Novi Sad/Podgorica, and DTV in Silovo, Kosovo).

Participants at the meeting

Kumanovo
Armend Aziri, NGO Doverba / Besimi
Shenasi Arifi, NGO Doverba / Besimi
Adnan Qaili, IPK / ‘Time Out’
Kadrije Ismaili, NGO Doverba / Besimi
Semate Isufi, NGO Doverba / Besimi
Shyqeri Xhaferi, NGO Doverba / Besimi (teacher)
Darko Rusevski, NGO Doverba / Besimi
Aleksandar Taskovski, NGO Doverba / Besimi
Frosina Tasevska, IPK / ‘Time Out’
Lendita Ajdini, IPK / ‘Time Out’
Vladimir Jakimovski, Youth Alliance Kumanovo
Stefan Manevski, IPK / ‘Time Out’
Sevdail Ramadani, IPK / ‘Time Out’

Trgoviste
Branimir Stojkovic, student
Miroslav Dejanovic, student
Davor Mitrovic, student

Presevo
Besim Nuhiu, NGO Visioni
Betim Shabani, NGO Visioni
Arta Dalipi, NGO Visioni
Shkurte Haliti, NGO Visioni
Filloreta Daliu, NGO Visioni
Naser Nuhiu, NGO Visioni

Edita Ajdini and Maurits van Heek represented and presented for Inter-ethnic Project Kumanovo.

Pierre Weber, Victor Lopez and Hajrulla Ceku from Global Perspectives Development Centre participated as observers.

Chrissie Hirst and Valbona Tahiri facilitated the meeting and represented EWI.
 

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