Women Network: Government is Responsible for Gender Equality

30 May 2007

During last week�s debate in the Sabor (Croatian Parliament) on the report submitted by Gender Equality Ombudsperson, Karmela Caparin, an MP from the ruling HDZ (Croatian Democratic Community), said that there is more discrimination in labour and employment now, compared to previous years. In her view, the main cause for such regression is the insufficient public visibility of the work done by the Ombudsperson. The Croatian Women Network reacted strongly to that statement, but also to the debate in general.

CWN says that Caparin�s statement is unfounded in reality. In their view, this is an attempt to create a smoke-screen, having in mind that this is an Election year, and to renounce the responsibility of the ruling party for the situation of women and to place the blame for a complext problem on a single institution.

Furthermore, the statement by Franjo Arapovic, who claimed that rural women are not discriminated, since all members of the household listen to their orders, follows a policy that intends to present the status of women through anecdotal evidence, arbitrary distribution of responsibility that the media find attractive, and declarations that don�t correspond and result in concrete measures and policies.

CWN emphasizes the fact that it is the Government of Croatia and its offices and agencies who are responsible for preparation of economic development strategies, legislative proposals, National policy for promotion of gender equality and measures and policies towards improved implementation of regulations.

They also emphasize the fact that Croatia still lacks a strategy for economic development, that 2006 passed without a valid national policy on promotion of gender equality, that Croatia has not ratified the Convention 183 of the International Labour Organization on protection of maternity in the workplace, and that gender equality legislation is, above all, declarative and lacks proper sanctions.

"Being a control mechanism itself, the Ombudsperson is neither competent nor responsible for any of the above, nor it is responsible for most of the objections presented by the MPs from HDZ and the HSP (Croatian Rights Party). We are concerned by the fact that members of Sabor�s majority don�t restrain from exposing their ignorance about the institution whose work they are about to assess, as well as the fact that they so readily dismiss any responsibility they or their Government may have in terms of gender equality policies�, says the Croatian Women Network.