Proposed changes to laws on primary and secondary education in North Macedonia leave space for discrimination, experts warn
Entrance to a high school in Skopje, North Macedonia. Photo by Meta.mk, used with permission.
This article is based on coverage by Meta.mk. An edited version is republished here under a content-sharing agreement between Global Voices and the Metamorphosis Foundation.
The Network for Protection Against Discrimination (NPAD) issued a press release on November 5, expressing concern over the possibility of adoption of draft laws for primary and secondary education which, according to them, would mean backsliding rather than progress in the protection of students from discrimination and violence within the educational process in Republic of North Macedonia (RNM).
The network states that the draft laws, contrary to established legal hierarchy, remove the protected characteristics “gender,” “gender identity,” and “sexual orientation.” According to them this is the first case of backsliding in regard to protection from discrimination in the Macedonian legislation.
Meta.mk interviewed competent officials in the Ministry of Education and Science (MES), as well as representatives of the network, who stated that the draft legislative changes enable gross violation of the rights of children, directly endangering their mental and physical integrity. Their reaction noted:
When institutions systematically exclude and erase certain groups of students, then they directly send a signal encouraging further exclusion and oppression of these groups in society. Additionally, such acts provide a signal to the aggressors, who inflict violence against women, girls and LGBTI+ students, that their actions are an extension of the institutional treatment of these groups, normalizing their violent behavior. By adopting these changes, the laws on primary and secondary education will become contrary to the provisions and the spirit of the Law for Prevention and Protection from Discrimination, which recognizes gender, sexual orientation and gender identity as bases for discrimination.
In addition, Maja Atanasova from NPAD told Meta.mk that, since they issued their reaction, the minister for education and science, Vesna Janevska, received their delegation in a meeting at the MES. Atanasova explained:
The minister was open for discussion, but at the meeting they stated they will not back down on their decision. The minister has previously stated that since the protections based on these characteristics has been covered by the Law for Prevention and Protection from Discrimination, the erased protected characteristics will remain in force through the open clause “and others.” Therefore, strictly legally speaking, the protections remain; however the amended laws would not be harmonized with the Law for Prevention and Protection from Discrimination, which violates the constitutional guarantees for respect of hierarchy of the laws. The problem is that laypersons, who are not trained legal professionals or jurists, would not read the whole legislative framework, but just open the particular law and realize that these grounds are not covered. This increases the risk for schools not to recognize the need to create mechanisms for protection from discrimination based on these characteristics, even though the statistics provided by the Commission for Protection and Prevention Against Discrimination indicate a serious need.
Minister Janevska has reiterated those positions in an interview with Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty published on November 3.
Vesna Janevska, Minister of Education and Science of Republic of North Macedonia. Photo by Meta.mk, used with permission.
Да не биде недоразбирање, на крајот на реченицата има ’и друго‘ што опфаќа секаков вид на дискриминација. Не знам зашто би требало да го оптоваруваме законот и да ги набројуваме сите видови дискриминации кои постојат, затоа што тоа е номо-техника…
To avoid misunderstanding, I have to note that at the end of the sentence there's “and others” which covers all kinds of discrimination. I don't know why we should burden the law and list all kinds of discrimination that exist, because that's part of nomothetic [expertise pertaining to creation of legislation]…
Representatives of Ministry of Education and Science told Meta.mk on email that they work on upgrading the legislative framework in the area of education and include all stakeholders in the process. According to them:
We especially value public opinion and that’s why we opened public discussion regarding six legislative solutions. We prepared draft-versions which we published on the government ENER system [Unique National Electronic Register for Regulations of the RNM] enabling comments with additional suggestions and proposals. The laws for primary and secondary education are defined in such a way to protect the students from any kind of discrimination, from segregation, and from various program or project activities which are not defined as part of the official curricula, and can harm their development and orientation. However Macedonia has a separate Law for Prevention and Protection from Discrimination in all segments, which means it covers education system also, and it can be applied under any circumstances.
They also clarified that the draft laws for primary and secondary education will be further forwarded to the parliamentary procedure, where the MPs will have opportunities to further amend a more perfect contents.
It’s especially important that MES will not only provide legal protection of students from discrimination and segregation, but that in the upcoming period it will work with the schools and the civil sector on preventive activities and education of students towards respecting diversity and building a peaceful, harmonious and safe studying environment. The minister discussed with the civic associations about these aspects of the education system at a meeting.
The reaction of the NPAD also includes the commitment of the government to implement the obligations imposed through the judgement of the European Court for Human Rights in the case of Elmazova and others vs North Macedonia. This judgement forced the institutions in North Macedonia to upgrade the legislative framework to prevent discrimination against the Roma.
However the network noted that the draft laws contain elements which don’t refer to that verdict, while directly and unequivocally representing violations of the international law and the human rights.
We remind that all freedoms and rights that the state has guaranteed to the citizens by ratification of international conventions are considered freedoms and rights guaranteed as fundamental value of the constitutional order. The General Comments of the Committee on the Rights of the Child, the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) in its general recommendations, the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence Against Women and Domestic Violence — have all been ratified and therefore have the same legal force as the existing laws in this Republic. Based on this, we must not allow adoption of laws which are in contrast to the ratified international conventions.
Previously, on November 1, the Gender Equality Platform, composed of 21 civil society organization working in this area, strongly reacted to the MES proposal to amend the laws on primary and secondary education by removing gender, sexual orientation and gender identity as protected characteristics, and replacing them with the words “equal opportunities.” They noted that these acts send a “clear message that certain groups are not protected from discrimination, even in the most sensitive areas of society, such as public education.”