Miraslau Kobasa: Citizens’ initiatives is a way to self-government

sapieha.org

Lately the second Tandem project, aimed at cooperation of local authorities and citizens, has finished.

The project started in 2011. It has an expressive name, from which the aim of the project becomes clear – assistance to cooperation between NGOs and authorities at a local level. The idea behind it is that people get united when they have some common work.

The partner of the Enlightenment Public Association “Lew Sapieha Foundation” was the Association of Local Democracy Agencies (Strasbourg, France).

The “EuroBelarus” Information Service asked Miraslau Kobasa, the chair of the Board of the Leu Sapieha Foundation, about the results of the competition.

- The first project, “Tandem I”, was planned for 2 years. Within its frames a competition for getting funds for 11 mini-initiatives was announced. There were two lots: one for projects, where both non-state and local authorities were participating. The second lot provided for individual application. We received 87 project applications for these projects, given that the information was mostly spread through social networks, - the chair of the Board of the Foundation tells.

The topics submitted for the competition covered very different spheres – from ecology and tourism to social aid: project aimed at ecological education of children submitted by young teachers from the village of Vezhny; a museum of Struve Geodetic Arc that is inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List opened by librarians in Halshany; a project called “Between the three lakes” aimed at agroecotourism in the village of Zdzitava, Brest region; a school for children with special needs in Rechytsa; a sports ground  created by the “Association of children and youth” together with teenagers and their parents in Homel; a part of cycle track in Malinauka district, Minsk created by the Minsk cycling community; a project aimed at providing social and psychological aid to cancer patients organized by the union of young women Christians from Smarhon.

It’s notable that local authorities helped with organization of only two projects out of ten.

Nevertheless, “Tandem I” was a success, and in 2013 the project “Tandem II” was launched. That time it was able to support 15 initiatives: 4 of them were made together with the authorities, 11 – only by citizens or their unions. 54 applicants were received, which was less than the number of the first project. However, it can be explained by summer – the time when many potential applicants were away.

- We were giving preference to regional projects: those who want to can find funding in Minsk, whereas it is much harder in the regions, - Miraslau Kobasa explains.

The project “Tandem II” also received a lot of interesting ideas. One of them is the joint initiative of locals and the Regional Executive Committee to establish the village chiefs club “KUT” (Culture of territory management).

- The project was aimed at enhancing the authority of the village chiefs. First we established the village chiefs club, where they discussed their common actions in order to resolve different problems.

Apart from that, we announced three competitions: the competition of citizens’ initiatives, the competition “The best landlord”, and children’s competition “My homeland”.

Within the frames of the citizens’ initiatives competition the chiefs held meetings with fellow-villagers, asked them about their needs, and offered them to nominate one initiative for the competition so that to realize it altogether.

- 9 initiatives were submitted for the competition, - Miraslau Kobasa says. – The jury selected three best offers: planting a garden, repairing a bridge over the swamp, and building a playground near the central homestead. People did all that with their own hands, whereas the necessary materials were bought at the expense of the project.

The competition “The best landlord” was aimed at motivating people to keep their homesteads in order. There were 18 homesteads that were fighting in it altogether. The winner got the valuable prize.

- The project turned out to be very successful; a lot of people from other villages came to the final fest and said “We also want such a project!” – tells the chair of the Board of the Leu Sapieha Foundation.

According to Miraslau Kobasa, successfulness of the project was seen in the attitude towards it: not as to an order from the authorities, but as to something that belongs to people themselves.

However, the cooperation of civic communities wasn’t always smooth. For example, one of the projects from Mahilieu that presupposed creation of graffiti on buildings was first supported by the authorities; however, when it came to its registration and a covering letter, they disclaimed it.

Sometimes it even happened so that the employees of the Regional Executive Committees were putting spokes in the applicants’ wheel, asking for unnecessary approvals of the project from the higher authorities or even refusing the “unnecessary” sporting project for kids.

- Can it be that the authorities are afraid of the funding source – the EU?

- Belarus is very undecided as to that. We have realized 30 mini-projects starting from 2011. We travel, we talk to the authorities, and let me say that the attitude to cooperation almost fully depends on what kind of person is in office and what is going on in this person’s head. Some officials say “let’s make 10 projects, we’ll approve all of them”, while the others claim that they “don’t need anything, everything’s all right, there are no problems”. Well, of course, there always will be problems…

- What is the prevailing attitude – is it positive, alert or even negative?

- If we compare 2011 and 2015, more and more local authorities have an adequate attitude towards such activity and are willing to cooperate. I think there are several problems. First, the authorities just don’t have the experience in realizing and writing projects. And in this connection, I think, we get quite a good tandem, where a civic organization that has corresponding knowledge and local authorities with its powerful administrative resource work together.

Secondly, the authorities don’t always understand the essence of such work, since sometimes the main thing for them is to buy, for example, the equipment. But what is equipment in itself? It’s a good and necessary thing to have, but only if it’s an instrument for realization of something that is more important: to win people’s attention, create conditions for citizens’ participation in resolving local problems.

The projects similar to “Tandem” should break the barriers between civic organizations and authorities, because they are to a large degree artificial and forced. Miraslau Kobasa is convinced that citizens’ initiatives is a way to self-government, without which Belarus has no successful and adequate future.