Civica Mobilitas celebrates a decade of change

“At the beginning of the previous phase of Civica Mobilitas, civil society was presented as a tree, with a large canopy, but weak roots. Today, that situation has changed a lot, thanks to the Civika Mobilitas and her insistence on restoring the CSOs’ ties with the citizens which has contributed to deepening the roots of that tree and making civil society an important player in changing of the society. This is the success of Civica Mobitas in this decade of existence”, said Ibrahim Mehmeti from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, during this year’s Civica Mobilitas Networking Meeting.

The participation of the Minister of Labor and Social Policy, Mila Carovska, in one of the debates, emphasized the role of the Civica Mobilitas community and the civil society sector in the dialogue with the institutions. She discussed with the participants, among other things, the issue of state funding, which CSOs expect to be implemented according to a new, more transparent methodology and, they did not hide the expectations for increasing the amount as well, gradually in the coming years to around 30 million euros per year.

Besides this, the CSOs asked the Minister Carovska about the changes in the way in which organizations for people with disabilities are funded, what the Ministry is doing regarding restoring the confidence in the management system, regarding the decentralization in the social sphere, as well as the migrations, environment etc.

Part of the debates was functioning of the Council of Cooperation with the Civil Sector. Numerous questions were answered by Zoran Ilieski, member of the Council.

The three- day event featured 97 CSO representatives that are a part of the Civica Mobilitas Community. They were working on intensifying their collaboration, setting joint priorities and laying the foundations for future joint actions. Furthermore, they were working to enhance their communication skills using new and interesting tools, and they also visualized their main accomplishments over the past 10 years, thus presenting the collective power they have built through their individual actions.

The Platforms of Collaboration were re-established. Their members defined the platform leaders, the objectives, as well as the draft agenda for future activities in 2020.

The participants were pleased to have the opportunity to meet new organizations, share their experiences, but also hear and learn from others. The new members of the community who are participating for the first time were very pleased his type of networking was met with enthusiasm especially coming from the new members of the community who are participating for the first time and were inspired by their colleagues.

The Networking Meeting remains the largest annual gathering of CSOs in the country and it represents a unique opportunity for the participants to share their experiences, discuss problems and to work together to solve them.