What has been done, what results have we achieved, how have we overcome the challenges, what are the prospects for future work? These questions were answered at a international seminar held on the Zoom Platform on February 17. The seminar was attended by people involved in the project "Online Vote-O-Meter for 2020 Georgian Parliamentary Elections". These were the representatives of the Fund "Sukhumi" and experts from the Visegrad countries: Klara Cozlova (Czech Republic), Katarzyna Zielińska (Poland) and Peter Guran (Slovakia).
These were several hours of active work: sharing experiences, talking about lessons learned, and developing strategies for future activities.
This is the first successful result of cooperation with Kobuleti local self-government!
It all started like this:
The Fund "Sukhumi" has been cooperating with the Gender Equality Councils of local self-governments since the day of their creation. Kobuleti municipality was included in this list in 2019. It was the only one, out of 11 municipalities, that did not have a single program to assist violence victims.
The advocacy and monitoring group and Tbilisi representative office of the Fund "Sukhumi" started active work to develop the program.
They are already leaders, as they conduct the activities of Women Support Centers in 11 municipalities. They attended many trainings, but teaching and learning is never superfluous. Therefore, a two-day training was held for the mobilizers of the Women Support Centers, where they discussed topical topics: the phenomenon of leadership, civic activism, advocacy strategy.
The online space has become a platform for the participants to share their knowledge and information. They saw leadership, teamwork and advocacy issues in a new prism.
On February 10-11 a consultation meetings was held with the representatives of Tsageri and Ambrolauri partner organizations and local governmental structures to identify respondents and to discuss about the third monitoring questionnaire planned within the project “Guria, Imereti, Racha-Lechkhumi General Forum of Civil Society Organizations for Roadmap Monitoring (PAR)”. Overcome challenges, in accordance with the agenda, in terms of transparency, efficiency and inclusion in the local municipality were revealed and mini-projects are planned to be developed within the framework of sub-grants program by the local civic sector.
“Schools against challenges of gender equality, gender stereotypes and domestic violence” - a new publication - this publication was prepared by the monitoring and advocacy group of the Fund “Sukhumi” last year. It reflects the results of a research, carried out in 11 municipalities of Western Georgia. Active work is underway to implement targeted policies in schools against gender stereotypes.
In this process, our partner is the newspaper "New Education", which has been published once a week since 1998, and is distributed among subscribers - in schools and universities of Georgia, as well as in government and non-government organizations working in the field of education. An even wider audience is covered by the online version of the newspaper.
I learned, I understood, I realized, now I can - these are the words of adolescents after our workshops.
These words express changes in their character, behavior, attitudes.
That was our goal: to teach these girls and boys...
"Teaching Conflict Management in Schools" - this is the name of the methodology, with which Larisa (Lela) Shengelia, conflict expert of the Fund “Sukhumi” is guided.
The rule is following: a group of 10-15 students is selected at school - mostly seventh-ninth graders. A workshop is held with the group once a month on various topics: what is conflict, stages of conflict, conflict resolution at an early stage, etc.
The code of ethics has been approved - this is an excellent result of project work! In this regard Vani municipality is the first among the municipalities of Western Georgia.
The working group of Vani municipality actively worked on the code of ethics for the officials. The developed document was reviewed by the services of the City Hall and City Council and was also posted on the website of the municipality for everyone to read and make comments. On February 10, at an ordinary meeting of the City Council, which was held under the leadership of Chairperson - Alexandre Liluashvili, the code of ethics was approved.
The fruitful cooperation between the civil sector and the local government of Tsageri municipality continues. Effective steps were taken. The third stage of monitoring of the roadmap for public administration reform. The local authorities offer more inclusion to the population, since the opinions of the residents of the municipality are prior for them.
Two civil society organizations actively work in Tsageri: “Active Citizen - Accountable Government” and “Tsageri Center for Women's Rights and Equality”.
News Agency “Regionuli Kvira” (Regional Week) reflects the activities of the project “A common forum for CSOs from Guria, Imereti and Racha-Lechkhumi for PAR Roadmap monitoring”.
“Equality Now” and “Civic Spectrum - Equality” - these civil society organizations from Bagdati attended an online meeting regarding the objectives of the third monitoring of public administration reform. The meeting identified the accents that should be highlighted during monitoring. Also reviewed the questionnaire and assigned responsibilities. It was noted that monitoring helps to initiate changes in the municipality.
The work is carried out in the framework of the project: “A common forum for CSOs from Guria, Imereti and Racha-Lechkhumi for PAR Roadmap monitoring.
