The Youth Movement Revolt is an organization that gathers and guides young people in the fight against injustice, poverty, violence, corruption, discrimination, irresponsible politicians and negative authorities. During the numerous actions organized by Revolt, as stated in the official presentation of the movement, several hundred young people joined from all over Bosnia and Herzegovina, young people of different religious, political, national and other affiliations who are ready to fight for their interests and a better future believing in the ideals of equality and social justice.
Author: Đorđe Krajišnik
We talked with Merisa Okanović, Anamarija Divković and Almas Bečić about the projects and activities of this organization, and their current work in the city of Tuzla and Tuzla Canton. As they point out, as part of their current project, they recently participated in a public debate on the budget of the city of Tuzla.
Youth being part of the City budget
– None of us has not done anything like that before, we are not experts in that field, but we made every effort to meet with Professor Admir Čavalić, who is also a City Councilor. He helped us a lot in budget analysis, took us through many spreadsheets which are in the budget, introduced us to the instructions on how much money can be allocated in accordance with legal regulations. Based on that, we found 26 points in the budget where we proposed that the planned allocations should be increased or decreased. The budget is, of course, complex in itself, the citizens cannot understand it just like that because it is not simple, we need to work on simplifying it for the citizens. We have prepared forms for citizens where we presented the idea of how to simply present the budget because there are rules if you want to make an amendment, said representatives of Revolt.
According to their opinion, they sent the mentioned amendments, guided by the fact that some of the budget’s items have to be changed.
– Most of our focus was on the honorarium of city councilors. They accepted four amendments, but not fully. They reduced the fees for local communities’ councils, for City Council’s commissions, but they did not reduce them to the extent that we asked for. They did not accept our increases for the youth grants, nor for the work of the Tuzla Youth Council. We asked for allocation of funds for independent businesses and entrepreneurs affected by the pandemic. This year, it was not planned in the budget, so our suggestion did not pass. We wanted to present all this to the citizens, so that people would become aware that there is a budget, said representatives of the Revolt for the Snaga lokalnog.
We also dedicated one of our shows Revoltucija to the Draft Budget of the City of Tuzla, which can be watched at the following link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIp-DnkyNBI
Another issue that is in the focus of the Revolt’s work is the improvement of the position of students at the University of Tuzla.
-It is very important to introduce electronic exam applications to the University, because the University of Tuzla is the only one that still uses the old principle of filling out application forms. Last year at the student forum we started discussing this topic again. Other organizations working with young people have been involved to speak out on the issue. After that, the informal group “Karton revolucija/Cardboard Revolution” joined, which focuses on current issues and problematizes them in public space. We sent a request to the University to find out how much money is allocated and which decision prescribes how to fill out applications for exams, and how is the money obtained from the purchase of application forms for exams distributed. The proposal for online applications was considered in the Assembly, but it was stopped. They voted against it, and it was, we think, a political decision. Because the proposal came from the opposition, the majority was against. Prior to that, we referred to the Assembly our initiatives related to higher education and most of our initiatives were on the agenda. We always refer our initiatives to the Commission for Education in the Assembly of Tuzla Canton, and to the Government of Tuzla Canton headed by the Ministry of Education and Science of Tuzla Canton. So far, our initiatives have been on the agenda regarding the issue of the University, but the percentage of their adoption is low. We attended some sessions of the Assembly, as well as the sessions of the City Council, explained representatives of the Youth Movement Revolt.
Youth strategy, without young people
Our interviewees add that as far as the issue of the mentioned online exam application is concerned, this is the most current problem, and that the public appearances of the Rector and the management of the University of Tuzla are promising, i.e., and that they hope the online applications will work until the next exam cycle.
– We found out that nothing is being done about it. The IT service does not have enough employees, and the problem is the lack of capacity because the IT service is also a legal service, and the non-established systematization of jobs also makes it difficult to solve this problem. For example, when we put pressure on the Rector, she puts pressure on that service that does not have enough capacity to deal with it, and there is a big influence of the Assembly of Tuzla Canton as the founder and source of funds of the University of Tuzla.
Since Revolt monitors the budget issues every year, did the City Council or the Assembly of Tuzla Canton include some of their proposals. They point out that in 2019 they requested changes to the work program of the City Council and that changes were made there, and that the entire document was adopted.
– They adopted that certain items on the agenda will be discussed in the year when the issue is significant and relevant, and not later. This is significant because burning issues are discussed at a time when their solution is needed. The following year we submitted some other items that they did not apply, but they left the already accepted items from last year, they did not change them.
During the conversation, we also talked about the important issue of air pollution in the area of Tuzla Canton, which according to many estimates is alarming.
– There is no concrete action. The city receives about 5.5 million BAM every year due to air pollution from the thermal power plant. Of that 5.5 million, some of the funds are set aside for environmental issues, but about half a million is spent on Slana Banja, the city co-finances users of heat pumps for buildings/houses who do not have the opportunity to use city central heating. But co-financing is also given to those citizens who could be part of the city central heating next year. Why aren’t these subsidies given to citizens that will not have that opportunity for a long time?
During the conversation with the members of “Revolt”, we also discussed the issue of women’s human rights, as topic that is always a huge issue in our society.
– This year, we worked with other organizations dealing with women’s rights and prevention of gender-based violence to distribute messages and red ribbons with the inscriptions “Nisam tražila”, “Nisi sama”, marking the Eighth of March. We symbolically distributed the ribbons for people to wear and thus spread the message of solidarity and togetherness throughout the city. The organization “Amica Educa” printed those messages, but also other messages such as “Nisam Tražila da me na razgovoru za posao pitate o planiranju porodice. Na razgovoru za posao razgovaramo o mojim stručnim uspjesima.” The Association of High School Students and other organizations that deal with these issues also joined the initiative. We also read the proclamation using a megaphone, with the same messages. Also, upon learning that there was sexual harassment and violence at the University of Tuzla, we immediately sent a request to all faculties to look into statements posted on the Facebook page “Nisam tražila” within their institutions, because there were many reports of sexual violence from Tuzla faculties. This was followed by a reaction from the Faculty of Philosophy, and the Academy of Performing Arts, and it is important to mention that the director of the National Theater Tuzla filed a criminal complaint against a person working in the Theater who is suspected of committing sexual harassment and/or violence, but did not want to disclose details until the investigation was completed. It is very important that public institutions, following the example of the National Theater Tuzla, protect their employees.
