Motrat Qiriazi

Report 2000

This year was perhaps the hardest, and most exhausting year for all of our activists since MQ began. We all felt under pressure to maximize the resources available (both human and financial) to the rural communities by working with international agencies to develop new opportunities for rural women. We all worked extremely hard to try and increase understanding by these agencies of the cultural and other realities in Kosova. Our coordinators all spent disproportionate amounts of time in meetings organized by the international community, both to try and discover what was happening, and to try and ensure the appropriateness of other programs. We found ourselves besieged by media, UN, and INGOs. Many of them wanted us to do all their ground work, so that then they could just move in and set up. Some wanted us to find staff for them, or accommodation, to set up meetings for them, to provide translators. What most didn’t seem to want, was to listen to us and our expertise. We were being used. They didn’t want to have to make changes to their plans based on our realities. They did want to move in and take over what we were already doing, or claim it for themselves. In many ways rural women and girls became ‘property’ to be competed over, and INGOs also treated the work of independent local women’s groups as a part of their own, as if it only happened because they had turned up.

Another major stress for the year 2000, was that everything was constantly changing and often local people had minimal access to any information about the changes. This increased feelings of insecurity amongst all locals. We no longer were clear, who was in charge of things, where to go if we had questions, if certain systems were functioning or not. Life became a more and more complicated maze.

By the end of the year we could start to see that the mountains of ‘emergency money’ poured (often times inappropriately, even randomly) into Kosova in 2000, would be soon stopped. So Kosovars had almost two years of splurge – with high salaries in international organizations, too many potential donors, an embarrassment of riches (not that we can always access it, it seems just to recirculate to others in the international community) and then suddenly, a big cut and a great reduction. Kosovo Women’s Initiative of UNHCR, has been a typical example of this – 10 million US dollars for two years, and then 2 million for the rest. It is hard not to focus on the destructive consequences of such short-term investments. And sometimes it is hard to see benefits outstripping disadvantages.

At the end of this year, we all realized that the extreme pace of work and the almost completely unpredictable nature of the future year had left our activists drained and exhausted. We had allowed the international community and donors and our own feelings of responsibility, to give us completely heroic targets; yes we would work on rebuilding communities, yes we would try and find ways to meet women’s needs, yes we would act as unpaid consultants to the internationals, yes we would try and advocate and lobby at every opportunity, yes we would try and educate the internationals, yes we would try and reduce women’s grief and trauma, yes we would go on all the trainings run by donors, yes we would do trainings when asked. And of course, no, we didn’t take care of ourselves, found it increasingly hard to talk about the contradictions and the pressures, and gave less and less time to our immediate families and relationships. We also had less time to concentrate and reflect on the way MQ was functioning.

We were able to achieve the following:

A. Setting up and consolidating women’s centers: We realized that our initial plan to set up six centers was too ambitious and would stretch our activists’ capacities beyond breaking point. Therefore we only set up two new centers – in Krushe e Vogel, and in Lugishte village (Has). At the same time we strengthened the work of the two existing centers in Gjonaj and in Mitrovica. This means that at the end of 2000 we have four centers not six. However, in Mitrovica we developed a program which included a large amount of outreach to women in surrounding villages.
Krushe center has become the focus of women’s lives in the village – they come when they are lonely, or when they need space, when they want to get out of their houses, or when they want to do some joint activities, when they need to find a new book or a new activity to do.
Mitrovica center is very much a space where younger women come to find support and to be involved in skills’ trainings and in income generation activities. They are able to bring their children, use the meeting space in the back for private meetings, or find support and advice from our activists which have counseling and legal skills. Many of the users are widows.
Lugishte women’s center was opened in autumn, and since then has become a focus for women to come for skills training. The opening of this center was planned very carefully, we knew that it would be counter productive just to go into the village (which we knew had experienced so much violence) and set up a project ‘for them’. Instead our activists from Has and Krushe e Vogel visited the community regularly, build trust and found out from the women what their needs are. When the time came that women expressed a strong desire for a center, our activists began working with women from Lugishte to plan it.

B. Overcoming trauma and grief in women, girls and children: This was done in three ways – through home visits in the communities, through tours of Kosova, through support of community based activities and celebrations.During the home visits our activists supported women through listening and informal counseling. These visits are very exhausting as the women from one house will all tell their stories and cry. Frequently such visits resulted in additional activities to support the material needs of women such as with medication or other aid. The other way was through small groups in the centers, facilitated by activists. These groups focused on finding ways to support each other, and usually resulted in the development of productive activities such as knitting or sewing. Activities with children included play, and creative activities.
As a result of such work, women began to make requests to break their isolation: so we organized bus tours around Kosova, where women could meet other women, and visit places. Some of the women had not seen other parts of Kosova before, except when they had been forced to leave their homes during the war. These bus tours acted also as rituals for women to break out of the narrow confines of their own grief and give support to other women. Part of the tour includes a pilgrimage to grave sites of some of the first families massacred in Drenica in 1998. So they were enabled to put their personal suffering in a wider context.

MQ also supported the organizing of community based undertakings in order to bring together villages fractured by war and post-conflict. We supported the Dance and Song Festival of Has. This festival had not been held for ten years because of the oppression by Serbian authorities. MQ activists were actively involved in its planning and execution. We were also able to make a donation, as most folk costumes had been destroyed when the houses of Has were burnt by the military in spring 1999. Song and dance is one of the more powerful healers of grief and trauma, and this festival which was taken to villages around Has, gave women and men the possibility to reclaim their damaged culture, and to feel strength again from their communities. MQ activists, updated the festival, by designing a specifically feminist piece. This is a representation through song of the lives of many rural women – and acted as a consciousness raising pieced, as it showed the lack of choice and the oppression most rural women still faced.

All the work, in Krushe and Lugishte is geared to supporting the women and girls overcome trauma and grief. This work is very emotional and intensive and involves MQ activists being there for the community whenever they are needed. The strategy was developed with acute attention to finding the right time to raise very emotional issues (such as about the missing and the disappeared) with very broken women. The work is very intuitive but also depends on the activists knowing deeply the personalities of the women in the community. Therefore we were in despair, when an INGO came to Krushe and began to work on trauma with the women without any coordination with us. Our activists realized immediately that the unsubtle approach of IRC was damaging the women. The coordinater said ‘over twelve months of careful work has been damaged, by their intrusive and bossy way of working with women’.

C. Women’s meetings to increase self esteem, decision making and knowledge base of rural women: We held meetings for women and girls in all of the centers on regular basis. During these discussions were facilitated to find out what was happening in the communities and what women wanted for the future. MQ activists encouraged women and girls to speak out about their concerns and needs. Not infrequently during these meetings women told us that international organizations had entered their communities and undermined the work or wishes of locals or of local groups including MQ. Increasingly such meetings have become forums to share information about what is happening with the running of Kosova, and to answer questions about all sorts of issues – such as; where can I get a prothesis for my son; can someone pay for my baby daughter to have a grave stone; which police is really in charge local or international; what laws are now in place etc etc?
During these meetings we also gave presentations or had outsiders come to give presentations on many issues including; health and reproductive issues; care of children; agriculture; women in leadership.

D. Educational courses and campaigns: rural women, most of whom were forced to stop education once married, are desperate for stimulating intellectual and practical knowledge. Girls also request access to education not easily available to them through the state system. Therefore MQ continued to run courses in all the centers. These included courses in sewing, literacy, and languages. In both Mitrovica and Has we worked hard to ensure that sewing skills could immediately be used for income generation, and were able to negotiate with UNDP and other buyers to sew sheets for hospitals and clothes for market selling.

Despite the indomitable presence of the UN, girls’ educational possibilities have decreased rather than increased. Internationals and locals in the Department of Education, as well as their advisors remained deaf to women’s groups words that girls are increasingly being denied education. (This is because of the high cost of travel to schools, and also in some cases, because of quota systems for students). MQ therefore continued its bursary fund until Autumn 2000 but were not able to find donors to continue this support to students. We also undertook a literacy campaign in the city and in the villages around Mitrovica: after going to every village to register illiterate girls and women. After registering (something UN never bothered to do) all cases, we found women to work as teachers, and set up literacy courses in homes.

E. Projects and sub-projects in other parts of Kosova: realizing that Prishtina now holds almost one-third of all Kosovars, MQ began to work actively with women from rural areas now living in Kosova (as their houses are destroyed or their men have moved here for work). We employed three widows to provide support to other rural women and to widows. They undertook home visits and distributed aid, as well as found ways to put the women in touch with each other to break their isolation. We opened in Prishtina a women’s patisserie which also provides training in cake making and setting up of small businesses to twelve women. This is funded by KWI.

Whilst all our centers support women in income generation activities, in Krushe e Vogel, we were able to take this in another direction, and developed a project for food production. After extensive research and then many negotiations we found a donor and built a factory for processing of peppers (Krushe is famous for its peppers) to make sauces, and condiments. This project is designed to ensure that as many women in Krushe as possible, can earn money to support their families (seeing as all but 7 men were massacred).
We also ran activities in other parts of Kosova after we had located girls who were involved in the meetings in Cegrane Camp in Macedonia.

F. Media work: Coordinators of MQ frequently spoke out on radio and in tribunes against violence against women including to raise awareness of the problems of trafficking, forced prostitution and domestic violence. We organized women only peaceful protests in Mitrovica and Prizren on March 8th and November 25th, so that women could speak out publicly about the different violences affecting their lives. This also included the problem of male family members detained in Serbian jails, and missing family members still not accounted for. As part of our support to mothers of the Gjakova prisoners (124 arrested and charged as a group for the alleged murder of one Serbian police man. They are charged with terrorism and therefore do not come under the amnesty law) we played important role in providing materials (such as blankets, mattresses, food) during their two week long 24 hour protest opposite UNMIK.

Other media work in 2000 included: publishing Albanian-English version of Flora Brovina’s poems, lobbying for the release of Flora Brovina; production of two films – one on the representation of Albanian women in myth (Ringjallja), one for school children in the USA on situation in Kosova for children at the end of 2000. Before the election MQ went all over Kosova with a performance concerning women’s leadership in Kosova, to strengthen the concept of women as competent leaders who should be voted for.

G. Other: MQ was the key group behind the first Regional Women’s Conference held in Prishtina in summer 2000. Our activists organized the funding of it, the design of it, the coordination of the management group, the logistics, the cultural events etc. Our efforts were extremely successful, and women from all over Kosova as well as from further afield, rural and urban were able to be together and discuss women’s issues. Priorities which emerged included violence against women and trafficking, as well as behavior of internationals. Our recommendations, were later used by the UNMIK Office of Gender Affairs, to devise a plan of action to advance the status of Kosova women. The conference was extremely empowering and important in that for the first time we gathered the many new women actively involved in women’s issues, and for the first time we were able to speak out publicly on key issues in a forum designed and organized by ourselves not by others for us.

MQ activists played a key role in supporting the newer women’s groups and women’s activists which have been founded because of international donor requests. We have done this in different ways, such as through giving aid and material support (such as computers, fax machine etc) to emerging groups. And through having one-to-one support consultations with activists from new groups. Roma and Serbian women’s groups requested that MQ provided training to them, and we were happy to do this.

Advocacy and lobbying have become a greater part of our work, and we have spent hours involved in meetings with internationals to gain resources, ensure wise policy and attempt to ensure that women receive equal resources to men. In some cases this has proven successful – for example, in Has, we persuaded the German INGOs which are rebuilding houses, to start by rebuilding the property of households headed by women. In other cases it is a much longer process; such as by being on decision making boards of other institutions.

Centrally, we have dedicated much time to advocacy in Prishtina on behalf of two groups – the farmers of Krushe e Madhe, and the Mothers of the Gjakova prisoners.

The project continued to develop a photographic documentary book about the work of MQ and the way we are helping to rebuild community in Krushe e Vogel. We hope that this will be in print by the end of year 2001. Additionally the work of MQ was featured in several newspaper articles (although they invariably did not mention our name – it seems journalists do not want to accept that people in groups, not just people individually, make change). This included articles and photographs in the UK Daily Telegraph, in a Danish Sunday Paper, and in the US left magazine Mother Jones. The one exception to this was a Swedish daily paper which featured an article about the work of MQ in Krushe e Vogel. One of the coordinators was featured in a Swiss Arts Project: a women’s labrinth, which honored one hundred women both past and present, who have changed the world.

Our activists have been involved in running many trainings for other women’s groups including; on financial administration and book keeping with STAR, on facilitation of work with women for a Canadian University Project, on basics of work with women for Roma women.
Our activists were able to take part in several international events such as: Conference on Violence against Women in Tirana, Conference on Reconciliation in Switzerland.

Number of Women Employed in Project & Role:
a) Prishtina based:
Igballe Rogova: Program Manager for all of MQ, international liaison.
Safete Rogova: Coordinator for Cultural events and liaison with Kosova institutions
Rachel Wareham: Finance work and administration.
Ilirjana Loxha: advocate assistant, activist,
b) Has andKrushe e Vogel:
Marta Prekpalaj: Regional Coordinator for Has and Krushe.
Shpresa Shehu: Activist in Krushe e Vogel, working on grief and trauma and linking.
Suzana Sprehu: Activist in Krushe e Vogel, working on grief and trauma and education.
Arjeta Zhupi: Activist in Has region, working with women and girls
Dashurie Jelliqi: Activist in Has region, working with women and girls
Merita Totaj: Activist in Has region, based in Gjonaj village
Rabije Hodaj: Librarian,based in Gjonaj villaged.
Merita Xhibexhiu: Activist in Has region, based in Lugishte village.
d) Mitrovica based:
Sanije Voca: Regional Coordinator for Mitrovica.
Emine Kaqiku: Lawyer
Lutfije Feka: Assistant in women’s center
Mirlinda Voca: Center administrator
Merita Olloni: Activist
Shenaj Gashi: Activist
Vetone Veliu (Kosova): Activist
Merita Shala: Activist

Number of Volunteers working on the Project: For all our work many women help and support. Men in the community are also crucial to ensure that the work can take place. Typical volunteer work includes: extra driving, logistics, delivery of aid, renovation of buildings, presentations and artistic events, restaurant owners and shop keepers also often give us discounts.

How activities went according to the Plans: The other were the support to Serb and Roma women and communities, the setting up of the Patisserie and training school, the organization of the conference. Due to the increase in work load, MQ recruited an extra assistant in Prishtina to do the logistics.

Future Plans: It is perceived that following areas of work will increase: advocacy, networking, support to other local groups, work with minorities, income generation, consolidation of work of centers. It is perceived that the following areas of work will decrease: work with children, material aid, bursaries.

Evaluation: Despite the rapid and unpredictable change around us, and the great number of stresses imposed on us, MQ was able to achieve results in many areas: we consistently raised the voice of rural women and girls in international arenas (even if they were not heard), we consistently challenged international agencies to adopt the best practice in participatory development and to include women and girls on their agendas, we consistently tried to raise our voices to challenge the currently dominant media image of Albanians as intolerant and conservative. Our staff worked in broad ways to respond to challenges and needs. We were able to consolidate and develop work in all the women’s centers. Our particular challenge here had been to work deeper and to be able to build on the skills’ training to find income possibilities. This did happen - through the setting up of the Pepper factory, and the Patisserie, as well as through the finding of outlets for manufactured goods. We also were able to take very active roles in supporting the development of new women’s groups and new activists throughout Kosova. Our biggest failing though is that we have not been able to spend time nurturing our staff, and building the teams as much as possible. We have lost more staff this year than ever before perhaps due to the polarization between personal and work lives (i.e. work took over the personal); one staff member in Has left, one left from Prishtina, and one left from Mitrovica.

MQ would like to thank our main donor KVINNA TILL KVINNA (Sweden), and other donors who helped different projects: Global Fund for Women (US) Urgent Action (US) Heart and Hand Foundation (US)
STAR (US), KWI