CIVIL event: End privileges!
Citizens for decades have been facing a bitter reality. People working in institutions who have been entrusted with high responsibilities, life, health, dignity, justice, rights and freedoms, are displaying utter immoral and greed. Privileges enjoyed by officials in the Republic of North Macedonia can rarely be seen anywhere else in the world, and certainly not in the developed democratic countries. The pivileges that officials themselves have voted for over the years, since the country’s independence, are nothing else but abuse and dissipation.
CIVIL demands END PRIVILEGES. According to CIVIL, the biggest privilege is to serve the interests of the citizens, to work on the development of democracy, the rule of law and respect for human rights and freedoms. There is no, and there should be no bigger privilege than that!
CIVIL is organizing the event END PRIVILEGES, dedicated to initiative with the same title for cancelling the privileges of officials. The event will be held on June 5 (Wednesday) at café Menada (Old Town in Skopje), starting at 5.00 pm. The event will be broadcasted live on the organization’s social profiles.
The demands for cancelling the privileges of ALL OFFICIALS, elected and appointed, former and current, at the local and national level, were published in CIVIL’s press release on May 14. The organization submitted the demands to the Parliament of the RNM on May 17, 2019, five minutes to twelve o’clock. A large number of media published CIVIL’s demands, while the citizens expressed their support through hundreds of comments, but also clearly formulated proposals on how to have the privileges of officials regulated. CIVIL has already received many proposals, and even a drafted legal text for regulating the positions and the status of officials and administration workers, which will be shared with the public at the event itself.
CIVIL invites the citizens to join the initiative END PRIVILEGES and to contribute to the cancelling of the privileges of officials, that is, their regulation and setting of reasonable boundaries, in accordance with the possibilities of citizens.
On June 5, before the start of the event at 5.00 pm, starting from 1.00 pm, at the same location, CIVIL’s team will be available for statements for the media, meetings and consultations with citizens whose proposals and documents are welcome.
CIVIL’s demands submitted to the Parliament of the RNM on May 17, 2019:
CIVIL – Center for Freedom demands from the legal and executive branch of government to put an end to the dissipation and privileges that the officials enjoy. Starting from previous presidents, and ending with managers of state agencies and institutions, all privileges must be cancelled, that is, reduced to a level acceptable for such a poor country that declares itself as a welfare state, according to the Constitution.
It is senseless to spend huge amounts of money for life-long privileges of former state presidents, regardless of whether they had been up to their task or were criminals. Simply, there is not a single logical reason for them to be living lifelong in luxury at the expense of the poor citizens of the Republic of North Macedonia.
Officials in the legal and executive branch of government, and certainly also the local government, have to give up their luxury automobiles, travel costs, representative expenses, overpriced trips for which they have weak excuses, luxurious furniture, procurement of artwork for “decorating” their working place, and all other commodiousness to which they are entitled to on the basis of laws behind which are suspicious, and even criminal motives.
Everything that has been procured until now, has to be sold, and for the money to be intended for improving education, health care and security. Instead of local sheriffs driving in automobiles of over 50.000 euros, firefighting and ambulance vehicles should be procured, or busses for students. Instead of overeating in restaurants, officials have to work on the fight against corruption and poverty in the country.
Appanages have to be abolished or reduced to a minimum. In this country, a beneficiary stops receiving social assistance if he or she earns extra income from collecting plastic bottles in the amount of 300 denars.
It is unacceptable to create, and then to maximally take advantage of all regulations according to which officials practically do not have to reach for their pockets at any time. With all due respect to exceptions that we know do exist, who act honestly and responsibly towards the public resources. However, individual good examples among officials are not enough!
CIVIL demands for all legal regulations to be revised, according to which excessive benefits are given both to current and outgoing officials. In times when we have children dying because of the poor health care, when the youth are in a huge percent illiterate, when people are starving and are freezing in their homes, 165.000 euros cannot be spent annually for someone, even if it is for a previous president.
CIVIL demands introduction of standards, according to which procurements will not only be transparent, but also rational! Vehicles must not be luxurious, nor in large numbers, but rather according to the practical needs of the institutions and the people managing them. The same applies to all the other aspects of their spending.
At the same time, we inform the Parliament of the RNM that CIVIL has already started receiving proposals for changes and interventions in a series of legal provisions that regulate the privileges, but also a number of over expensive procedures in various domains of the functioning of the institutions at all government levels in the country.
END PRIVILEGES!
Channels where there will be live broadcasting of the event END PRIVILEGES on June 5 (Wednesday) starting at 5.00 pm are:
Comments and proposals may be submitted at the following contacts:
[email protected]
[email protected]
www.facebook.com/civil.mk
