“What is the role of civil society organizations in social-political processes?” “Usually wrong, because it is understood from a wrong perspective! The role of civil society organizations is to be a corrector of the government and to lead social-political processes on the right path, and in no way should they be guided by the idea to enter government, that is definitely a wrongly set civil sector!”, outlined Valentina Disoska, President of the Association of Business Women.
“What is their role in political and social processes, are they perceived as “fraudsters” or “progressives”?
Forgive me, my background is entrepreneurial, I come primarily from the private sector and this question cannot be raised in the private sector. Why? Because in the private sector you cannot prosper with fraud, there you immediately recognize who knows how to their job and who is a fraudster.
There are progressives in the private sector too, they are the ones who move us forward in development, and there are also not many opportunities for manipulation here, why? Because if the product is no good, it will not pass the market, and here the buyer decides, who is cruelly honest.
Sorry, but the epithet fraudster is not given for any reason at all, they say where there is smoke there is fire. Do you here know, have come across organizations and individuals who are misleading in the NGO sector and at the same time have put you in an awkward situation because they were fraudsters? It has happened to me, we had a partner organization that was as such, where in order not to have a fiasco we had to get their activities done, we even wrote their report, and why all of this? So that our project was not a failure. What is most tragic is that the fraudsters still mislead and exist, certainly they will never be my partners anymore, but for sure they will find others to falsely present themselves to.
And now I want to talk about one more thing, about professionalism, recognition, building an image, a brand from the organization, building capacities of the staff working in the organization! Kudos to organizations who offer free education to NGO cadre, we also do that very often, but I think that it is a very wrong approach! Every knowledge should be paid, every training should be at a market price, because only then those who attend training will be serious in their further education. Knowledge costs, and free education is a totally wrong approach, which is neither certified, nor is there verification of the knowledge!
And now this last thing is horrible, a wrongly or half educated cadre does more harm than good!
And to finish I will say, my 5 minutes will end, I will ask, how many of the organization here have s precisely determined mission, vision, goals of the organization that are strictly defined, with a certain cause, to which they are committed to?
The NGO sector has to be classified, a cadastre needs to be made with a strict division of the roles of the NGO sector, because one same organization with the same staff cannot work on environment and economy, a little bit on human rights, a little bit on agriculture, women’s rights… Because when you combine a partially educated staff with organizations who do a bit of everything, because their cause is broad and they work in every field, that is exactly when you get the epithet of “fraudsters”.
Additionally, a cadastre needs to be made of donors, projects, activities and everything that is being done in the NGO sector. We will have much benefit as an NGO sector, we will know what each donor supports, which project, what they have achieved, what each organization has achieved with the projects in their work and certainly the syndrome of “The ground is hot lava” will be avoided, which keeps repeating itself, and every organization that decides to work in a certain field starts as if nothing existed before it, from the beginning and over again from the beginning and so on. Growth and development is not followed, there are no projections for moving forward…
And once we do all of this, when we will have information that will be updated, we will be able to follow what is being done, and only then we will know about the contribution of the NGO sector and the efficiency in the political and social processes… because without data we cannot create policies or social processes!
And lastly, since I do not have enough information about the work of other organizations, I can talk about the Association of Business Women, about the achievements in the political and social processes. After 10 years of work, we have succeeded to become recognized, women entrepreneurs, our target group is becoming increasingly more aware about our efforts as well as about the fruits of our work. The benefits, the conditions we have fought for and are still fighting for are relevant for our target group. The recognition by the institutions, as a relevant factor for policy making in the area of women entrepreneurship, the Strategy for Women Entrepreneurship Development adopted by the government, that gives us legitimacy and a clear picture that we are on the right path!
And one more thing, we are building the National Platform for Development of Women Entrepreneurship because we are aware that we are stronger when we are supported by more organizations. I invite you to be part of the Platform for Women Entrepreneurship, so that we can achieve greater results in creating conditions for growth and development of women entrepreneurship!
translation: N. Cvetkovska
