Dialogue with the President of the Republic of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić

The Opre Roma Srbija movement organized a video dialogue with the President of the Republic of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić. The dialogue had tremendous visibility. Over a million people saw the post on the Opre Roma Srbija Facebook page alone. There were over 1500 people all over Serbia in the online room with the President of the Republic of Serbia with whom he spoke directly. In addition, over 25,000 people watched live on the Facebook page of Opre Roma Srbija alone, and that number is growing. Mostly all media reported about this event. The content of the dialogue was on the topic of employment and entrepreneurship, participation in public and political life,  equality that resulted from our internal dialogue with the Roma community. The President was open to hearing all the challenges and ready to take on some important responsibilities as a result of the dialogue:

1. Regarding employment and education, the President of Republic Serbia agreed that it is not good for Serbia, for Roma to remain marginalized from the labor market but to smartly activate the potential for labor and small and medium business among Roma, emphasizing that Roma are important for economic growth of Serbia. He said, “Roma are smart, strong, hardworking and we as a state must do more about it.”He also said: “As much as we want to bring Serbs back to Serbia, we also have to bring Roma back to Serbia, because they have learned languages ​​and skills that are important for our economy” It was agreed to form a group to devise measures with the next Government, the Opre Roma Srbija, and the Office for Roma Initiatives of the Open Society Foundation, stimulating market-driven education, including vocational training.

2. We talked openly about political participation in vote-buying. The President of  Republic Serbia is ready to oblige his party to meet with our movement and educate his party leadership about it, and he will make sure to introduce party discipline against that practice. At the same time, the President agreed that Roma is underrepresented in the state administration. Given the significant number of already educated Roma, the President agreed to find a way with the future Government to employ Roma in the state administration.

3. On the topic of Roma and equality, the President undertook to take drastic measures against any individuals and extreme right-wing groups that attack Roma. Finally, the President of the Republic of Serbia will join the Oprah Roma petition in support of movements in the United States against racism caused by the assassination of George Floyd. Link with the whole dialogue