Representative of the NGO Mladiinfo Montenegro attended the discussion entitled “Are We Staying Here?”, Organized by the Montenegrin Organization for Independence and Mobility (COSMO) in cooperation with the Budva Foundation and the Green Platform Montenegro. The discussion was held on May 17, 2019, at the premises of the Faculty for European and State Studies.
This discussion was an opportunity for the representatives of parliamentary political parties and representatives of non-governmental organizations dealing primarily with youth issues to share their opinion on the burning problem of youth departure from Montenegro.
The moderator of the discussion was Andrijana Radović (COSMO), who emphasized that the best young people should not be allowed to leave, but added that the problem can not be solved only in the structures, but the problem should also be asked in the youth. She also pointed out to an extremely small number of young people who made the audience at this event.
“Young people need to be more interested, that their only goal is not to get employed after studying in the civil service, or to comply with party employment or simply leave the country,” Radovic pointed out.
Goran Ivo Marinović, in front of the Budva Foundation, reminded that the changes are necessary and that the goal of this panel is actually to bring together the participants to find out how much change is needed to make the young people stay in the country and what are the new ones to be introduced.
In front of the SDP, the speaker of the youth forum, Emir Hadžimusovic, said that the information that 66% of young people wants to leave the country is not surprising.
“I do not want to go into the story to blame somebody, but you mentioned whether the young ones need to change, and I say yes,” Hadžimusic said.
He says that people want to go without the need and desire to change something in their own country.
“There is no desire of the youth to change something, they choose to be guided and not lead, and when you lead them, they know best how you should do it, and here I see a problem in a mentality that we will hardly change,” he adds.
Representative of the Student Initiative, Vuk Vujisic, said that a regional campaign was launched with a haunting “uncanny”, which is yet to come to life with us. As one of the problems he sees economic instability in the country.
“We have launched a campaign, not with the goal of blaming young people why they are going, but together we find the problem why young people go and accept it as a problem,” Vujisic said.
He also added that young people do not go to meet other cultures and countries are already practically going in search of a better life, and he also pointed out that more schools should work on civic education.
One of the recent problems that young people today encounter is the University’s decision to ban the pre-war, and more than 2,000 young people who want to work on the Work and Travel program in America.
Young people are forced to choose between academic duties and work, and hence, if they are revoked, the revolted people choose not to return.
Andrija Nedović from the organization of Montenegrin students points to the good side of studying and working abroad, but suggests a network system that could be developed to make it easier for young people from Montenegro to go to a country, but also to facilitate their return to our system.
Andrija Cetkovic spoke in front of the Democratic Party of Socialists, “we are all raised on the stories of our parents that they lived in a certain ideal time and that everything worked differently than today. In fact, it seems to me that it is crucial that the times have changed and that we are in the world technology where everything works faster and more risky. “
He thinks we should face the changes and accept them. He notes that we have a lot of resources that are not used to the maximum, such as the Ministry of Agriculture that wants to encourage people in agriculture, tourism, and is a witness that more and more young people go abroad to work seasonally abroad while they have the opportunity to work in their own country.
Miodrag Vujovic in front of the organization KOD reminded that in the last 25 years Montenegro has left 140 thousand citizens.
“This should be an alarm for all of us that something should be done. I see there is a desire to change something, but I do not see anything changing for the young,” Vujovic said.
In his presentation, he talked about one of the reasons why young people leave, and that is that young people prefer to work abroad for seasonal jobs for much greater financial compensation than that is the case with us.
“Somebody when he goes outside and feels the benefits, how much more he can, he will hardly decide to return and work for much less,” he added.
He also added an example of “pay pal”, where citizens of our country can not receive money in Montenegro through this system. Reminds that there is a so-called. freelancers, people who would earn some particular money through the provision of certain services and products. However, here is the situation that the commission through banks is at least 20 euros, and therefore banks are earning and it is not in their interest to introduce this service.
Representatives from democratic Montenegro, Juventas, Center for Civic Education, Active Zones, Union of High School Students of Montenegro, Student Council of the Faculty for State and European Studies, Movement for Change, Bosniak Party of Montenegro, Civil Movement of URA and the second.
From democratic Montenegro, they recalled a strategy for young people that they believe was a dead letter on paper. It involves facilitating employers who employ young people, encouraging young people to get hired.
Maja Markovic of the NGO Juventas pointed to the situation in Croatia since she joined the European Union and pointed out somewhere that Montenegro is facing the same fate if we are entering the EU recently.
“Bearing in mind the situation that is today, I believe that the EU will later introduce some additional restrictions in terms of the visa regime,” Markovic said.
She believes that neither the mentality nor the system is already connected, but added that the system creates our mentality.
She also briefly referred to the migration itself, striving to define that they are not only related to the emigration of young people from Montenegro, but also the eviction of young people from the north and migration from the city to the city-
Seasonal employment and vocational training programs see short-term measures.
She also emphasized that the educational system does not absolutely contribute to the development of true values in young people.
Nikola Zirojević addressed this discussion in front of the Social Democrats.
“When it comes to this issue, I would somewhat divide it into two parts, since it is not clearly defined where it is” here “and I would refer to migrations within Montenegro and to migration outside of Montenegro,” he stressed.
He points out that Podgorica as a city is overcrowded today, as is the influx of the population from the north to the south, which Zirojević sees as an equally important problem as the emigration of young people from Montenegro.
As a second problem, “brain drain” is seen abroad but does not consider this information as alarming as the fact that 60% of young people want to leave but they do not leave.
Milos Knezevic, in front of the CCE, spoke about statistical data from recent research, which indicates that 50.7 percent of young people want to leave Montenegro, but that the level of satisfaction with the lives of young people indicates that young people are still satisfied.
The reasons for the departure of young people who have been detected are: young people want to improve their standard of living, they want higher salaries, better job opportunities, the escape from a difficult situation.
More word was about the education system, while the opinions were divided whether it should be improved or changed from the roots.
What all the panelists agree is that in these discussions, it is necessary to have the presence of young people who can, however, give the best answers to such questions that concern them directly.
Some of the problems mentioned are part-time employment, judiciary, trust in political parties, sense of unfairness in employment, and others.
A large number of possible solutions are not offered.
One of the offered solutions are subsidies for students employed during the studies, flexible and part-time work, strengthening the education system, granting scholarships by the state that would oblige students who go abroad to study to return to their own country and the acquired knowledge is applied here .
As a common model of action of the non-governmental sector and political parties, the participants see in the debate, where they, however, have respected this topic together with some future joint actions.