November 9^th, 2018 – Council for preventing and eliminating discrimination and ensuring equality (Equality Council) has launched “Equal Rights in Rural Communities” awareness campaign.

The city of Tvardita is one of the regions, where “Equal Rights in Rural Communities” awareness campaign is run and the Equality Council team organizes a public lecture for 40 persons, such as teachers, educators, doctors, policemen, social workers, the city hall and the post office employees.

“The city of hall of Tvardita support any social awareness, and we have decided to get involved the Equality Council’s campaign, because our people should be informed about legal mechanisms for protection against discrimination and to know where to address in case if they are discriminated”, said the Mayor of the city hall.

Local people were invited to the Equality Stand in the city centre to interact with the team and to receive informational materials, i.e  Guide for petitioners adopted in 6 spoken languages, flyers for preventing discrimination in employment, booklets for raising awareness of tolerance, acknowledgement about diversity, and combating discriminatory deeds

A part of the materials was donated to the local library for all interested persons in the field of anti-discrimination policies.

In the course of the lecture the video “Protect your rights, don’t accept to be discriminated” has been shown to all the participants. It explains how a complaint is received and analyzed in order to state a discriminatory case.

“According to Council’s data, it has been receiving annually 160 complaints and only 30% of complaints are received from the rural area. The main problem is not connected to the fact that discrimination doesn’t exist in the rural area, the main issue is that people are poorly informed about protection mechanisms against discrimination. That is the most important reason why we have launched Equal Rights in Rural Communities campaign together with our partners”, said Council’s member Evghenii Alexandrovich Golosceapov.

Some of the participants decided to share their stories about discrimination based on ethnic and linguistic criteria. However, the case of Tvardita is completely different, people shared that there were representatives of ethnic minorities, who had overcome social barriers and stereotypes, and today they have become successful professionals.

The lecture provoked lively discussions about discrimination in educational establishments. “It’s hard to integrate children with special needs because teachers have a lot of work with papers, which steals time that can be given to special kids. A well, teachers are highly interested to help different children reach results”, highlighted one of the participants.

For the first time, when Council left free envelopes at the postal office for victims of discrimination and witness of discriminatory acts.

People, who have access to the Internet, can apply an online-complaint on the Council’s Web site www.egalitate.md.

Equal Rights in Rural Communities awareness campaign is run from November 6^th to 30^th, 2018 in the following regions Congaz (Gaguazia region), Tvardiţa (Taraclia region), Corlăteni (Raschani region), Sipoteni (Calarasi region), Slobozia Mare (Cahul region) and Vărzăreşti (Nisporeni region).

The primary goal is to inform society about its right to equality and about legal methods for protection against discrimination.

This campaign is launched by the Council for Preventing and Eliminating Discrimination and Ensuring Equality in partnership with the Institute Penal Reform with the support of the Program for the Financing of Human Rights Initiative / Change Projects. This program is carried out with the participation of the Institute for Penal Reform within the project “Strengthening the technical capacities of national institutions for the promotion and protection of human rights” financed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark and implemented by the United Nations Development Program.