During the second regional meeting, we spoke to Ru\u017eica Stojanovska, representative and program co-ordinator of Ohrid Institute from Macedonia . As founder and director of successful political dialogue project, Ru\u017eica improved the status of freedom and responsibility among young people. Also, we talked with her about new ambitious project for the next year, Balkan Forum.<\/p>\n
1. In Macedonia you work with politically engaged young people. What is the best way to stimulate and encourage young people to become active about freedom and responsibility issue?<\/strong><\/p>\n For the past six years we cooperated with all political parties in Macedonia and organizations within the parties that gather young people. Although it wasn’t easy in the beginning, I have to say that we made a great progress about perception of their rights, freedoms and responsibilities. Thanks to project that involved trainings, debates, seminars and preparations for the elections, young people became aware of their capabilities and motivated to make conscientious and responsible decisions. I think it’s imporatant to be part of an organization, to struggle and to be responsible. The good news is that number of young people in the management committees parties rose per 10 percent. It is an indication that the awareness and the level of responsibility among the youth is growing.<\/p>\n 2. How will Balkan Forum contribute to developing economic freedom and private initiative not only in Macedonia, but in the region?<\/strong><\/p>\n This Forum is primarily intended for business community of countries in the region and libertarian organizations engaged in promoting freedom, which will further contribute to their networking. I consider this networking veru useful because the representatives of business groups will have opportunity to present all the problems they are facing, such as complicated customs procedures. On the other hand, thanks to the theoretical background, organizations will be able to show them all the possible ways to solve there problems and increase economic freedom. Also, trough workshops and training sessions, Balkan forum is going to have an educational role. In addition to this, we would like to include representatives of the government in this project. Our goal is to implement the proposals we reached in order to improve freedom level in Macedonia and region.<\/p>\n 3. How important is support of local, regional and international partners for this ambitious project?<\/strong>\u00a0How do you plan to provide the support?<\/strong><\/p>\n In the Balkans, people are saying that we are not sufficiently philantropic society and that the buisness community is not aware of the necessity of such initiatives. I am really glad that international organizations recognized that and expressed wish to support us. One of the most important partners is Atlas Network, which gave us support for this project. Also, support of local and regional partners, sush as Libek from Serbia, is very important. Balkan Forum isn’t grass root initiative organized by Ohrid Institute. It is a regional project which includes regional organizations. I think it’s the only way to create a new brand that is going to have an impact on cooperation and support in the region.<\/p>\n 4. How do you evaluate the relations among the political elites of countries in the region?<\/strong><\/p>\n A year ago we participated at the Regional Balkan conference that was organized by Libek. As we discussed about political and economic factors, as well as the elite in our countries, we concluded that in the all countries of the region is the identical situation. Although the Balkans is said to be “The Powder Keg”, it is obvious that the communication and a ratio among political elites strengthen. First of all, that happens because of, already mentioned, identical behavior pattern of elites in the region. The second reason is primarily related to the countries that haven’t yet acceded to the Europian Union. Because of the similar position this countries developed stronger cooperation. In such a situation mutual support is very important. Current cooperation is satisfactory and I’m glad in increases every minute.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" During the second regional meeting, we spoke to Ru\u017eica Stojanovska, representative and program co-ordinator of Ohrid Institute from Macedonia . As founder and director of successful political dialogue project, Ru\u017eica improved the status of freedom and responsibility among young people. Also, we talked with her about new ambitious project for the next year, Balkan Forum. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13336,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[161],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13335","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n