Centre for
Protection of Minorities' Rights
Sarajevo
Information on the Status and
Problems
of the Romanies in Bosnia and Herzegovina
I
The general status of human rights and
fundamental freedoms of the citizens of
Bosnia and Herzegovina should be viewed
in the light of the fact that this state
is still far from having an established
legal system and a set-up of state
authorities necessary for a democratic
society and rule of law. Since the
overall constitutional and legal system
of the state is basically characterised
by one-sided domination of ethnic
factors, and since proponents of its
destruction are still to a great degree
active on the political scene, the level
of enforcement and protection of human
rights and fundamental freedoms of the
citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina is
consequentially far below the necessary,
at times even below the tolerable limit.
The ruling national political parties,
which see themselves as representatives
of the interests of “their own”
people (Bosniak, Serb or Croat) have
narrowed down the scope of their concerns
in regard to the organs of the state
authorities only to “their own
people” so that the members of ethnic
minorities have been de facto left
on the margin of social interests. This
primarily and particularly refers to the
largest ethnic minority in Bosnia and
Herzegovina – the Romanies, who on the
other side also were drastically affected
by the recent war. Hit by poverty,
unemployment, lack of education, most
frequently in need of elementary living
conditions, not aware of their rights,
and minimally interconnected and
organised among themselves, the Romanies
are even in the peace time the ethnic
group in Bosnia and Herzegovina which is
most frequently exposed to
discrimination.
II
1.
The data on the number of the Romanies in
Bosnia and Herzegovina are very
contradictory. They vary from about ten
thousand (according to the census from
1991) to about hundred thousand (as some
of the representatives of Romanies’
associations claim). There is a number of
indications which lead us to conclude
that at the time of the 1991 census the
number of the Romanies was much higher
than given in the official figures.1
This can be explained by a whole set of
circumstances, among which (along with
their specific way of life, and, almost
certainly, their lack of interest for the
census itself) there is a very distinct
characteristic of the Romany population
to adapt to the actual situation of the
environment they live in, including the
acceptance of the customs, religion and
language of that environment, even of
ethnic identity. It is there, as well as
in the particularly difficult war
circumstances, that we are to look for
the reasons why many Romanies during the
last war and up to date declared
themselves as members of Bosniak people,
in some cases even of Serb people
(without mentioning their Romany origin).2
The number of about seventy thousand
could be taken as the most close figure
for the Romanies living in Bosnia and
Herzegovina on the eve of the war. But we
should note here that a significant
percentage of this population is now
abroad as refugees.
These facts are the driving motive for
the Romanies to ask that a separate
census for them be taken in Bosnia and
Herzegovina as soon as possible. For that
purpose they addressed several times the
highest state and political authorities
in BH, but have not received support in
that. They believe that this is the
result of the position of the Party of
Democratic Action primarily, which is
afraid that it could lose a large number
of its voters at the elections in
consequence. Therefore, several
non-governmental organisations of the
Romanies are planning to conduct the
census of the Romany population in BH,
and are in search of donations for that
purpose.
2.
There are no coherent data about the
plight of the Romanies in the recent war.
A number of their members took part as
combatants within the one of the three
armies that were fighting each other in
the war. There are many cases of Romany
combatants who were killed or wounded,
but the Romanies believe that the
families of the killed soldiers and
disabled veterans who came from this
people are discriminated against when
trying to realise their rights on that
basis. Indeed, the plight of the Romanies
in the war is particularly pronounced in
terms of the number of refugees and
displaced persons coming from the ranks
of this people. It is estimated that more
than half of the Romany population (some
believe even 2/3) were expelled during
the war to other parts of BH or have
escaped abroad. Until that moment the
majority of them were living in the
territory of Republika Srpska.
3.
The primary issue in respect of the
present state of human rights and
fundamental freedoms in Bosnia and
Herzegovina is the return of refugees and
displaced persons from this population to
the places of their pre-war residence and
return of their houses and real property.
Their desire, even obstinacy, to return
is visible, despite the fact they are
faced with extremely great difficulties,
blackmail, frequent harassment,
humiliation, etc.
The return of the Romanies to
Republika Srpska has not advanced far
from the very beginning. Truly speaking,
there are some indicators showing that,
as of recent, there are some improvements
in behaviour of the governmental
authorities, however the process is very
slow, accompanied with a continuous
obstruction and pronounced lack of most
essential financial resources. A great
number of the Romanies from this entity
has already returned to Bosnia and
Herzegovina but only few of them moved
back to their houses. Displaced persons
of Serb ethnic origin, and in few cases
even the state bodies of Republika Srpska3,
are as a rule accommodated in their
houses. Also, while the Romany returnees
live as sub-tenants (paying high rental
fees) in rented garages, sheds and
improvised plastic tents, not only that
other persons are inhabiting their
houses, but in several cases even cattle,
corn, wood, etc. is kept in their
dwellings and yet the present occupants
do not allow them to move back in. Some
of their houses are even kept empty.
In all this, there were several cases
of blackmail, i.e. the present occupant
of a house of a Romany demanded from the
Romany owner of the house to pay certain
sum as compensation for moving back into
his own house (or even only a part of the
house). In some cases, the persons giving
such compensation were even cheated at
the end, because on the same day when the
former occupant moved out of the house
another person would move, obviously in
agreement with the previous occupant.4
In the territory of the BH Federation
as well, a great number of the Romanies
had the status of refugees or displaced
persons. Their return to the territory
under the control of the Bosniak
political parties was not prevented, but
the returnees faced various difficulties,
even discriminatory acts. There were many
cases of ill-treatment and threats
because of their leaving Bosnia and
Herzegovina during the war (“instead of
defending their homeland”). This was
particularly expressed in the territory
of the municipality of Zavidovici, Travnik and
Banovici in which (under this pretext)
there were instances where grenades were
thrown on the Romany houses. However, the
general estimate for this area too is
that the Romanies are not on equal
footing with the members of the majority
population in regard to the creation of
conditions for return, as they are many
times left out when the resources for
repair of houses, waterworks, electric
energy, roads, etc are being allocated.
During
the war, the Romany population mainly
left the territory of the BH Federation
where HDZ is now dominant. Their return
to these territories is still at the very
beginning.5 Here, we should
mention basically an isolated case of the
municipality of Vitez, in the territory
of which a great number of the Romanies
stayed throughout the war, and in which
the municipal authorities are maintaining
contact with them and expressing an
interest in resolving their problems.
4. In
the situation of generally very high (and
alarming) unemployment rate in Bosnia and
Herzegovina, the Romanies are simply an
ethnic group without employment in this
country. Concretely speaking, even among
only the symbolic total number of
employed Romanies, the situation is such
that, as a rule, that one or two Romanies
are employed per one municipality, mainly
on the jobs of city cleaning service.6
As an exception to this, we should
mention the territory of the Tuzla Canton
and the municipality of Visoko where the
situation is not as disastrous as in
other areas. Still it is far from
satisfactory, and they do not have the
equal treatment with the majority of
population in these places.
The consequence of this severe
unemployment situation is that the
majority of the Romanies engage in the
re-sale of goods or in begging. They are
therefore particularly embittered with
the market inspectors who confiscate the
market articles and they all claim,
without exception, that they are being
discriminated against in comparison to
members of other peoples.
All the above indicates that the
social-economic situation of the Romanies
in Bosnia and Herzegovina is particularly
alarming, and it is realistic to
anticipate that it might even further
deteriorate. This latter possibility is
due to the fact that the process of
privatisation will as a consequence have
a great number of redundancies and to the
fact that great number of Romanies who
have returned from abroad are still
thriving on their savings. In addition,
the Romanies deem that the process of
privatisation itself is discriminatory
against them, since they also had
participated in generation of this
material wealth to be privatised, and yet
they will be completely excluded from the
process, being poor and unemployed.
5.
The extremely high illiteracy of the
Romanies in Bosnia and Herzegovina is now
accompanied with alarming low percentage
of Romany children who attend schools. It
is unacceptable to justify this by
claiming that it is primarily such
decision of their parents that is the
cause of this. It is true, that this
happens as well, but the much deeper
cause of this is their precarious
economic situation, in which they are not
in position to provide the most
elementary conditions for children to
attend the schools (clothes, books,
personal hygiene, etc.) Apart from that,
the Romany children attending the schools
are frequently exposed to insults and
other kinds of harassment, amounting even
to physical assaults, which in many cases
resulted in parents forbidding the
children to attend the school any longer7.
But there are also rare positive examples
of Romany children attending the schools
in larger numbers (Visoko8, Zavidovici,
some suburban areas of Brcko, some places
in the area of Tuzla Canton9).
What is to be particularly emphasised
here is the fact that the Romany language
becomes almost totally extinct in Bosnia
and Herzegovina. It is obvious that the
Romanies themselves do not show an
interest in its preservation for number
of years already. There are surely many
reasons that have led to this, of which
the ethnic and religious confrontation,
which was quite cruel in these
territories in the last decade, is a
dominant one. Under such circumstances,
the Islamic religion of the Romany
population in Bosnia and Herzegovina not
only had an influence on Romanies
neglecting and forgetting the Romany
language, culture and tradition, but also
had as a consequence that a significant
percentage of the Romanies declared
themselves as Bosniaks. However, it is
true that lately the Romanies of Bosnia
and Herzegovina have a rising sense their
own ethnic affiliation. There are several
examples of this ethnic group trying to
preserve their culture, tradition,
folklore, and similar (Tuzla, Sarajevo,
Bijeljina, Vitez, Visoko, etc.) by
forming folklore clubs, expressing desire
to organise Romany language courses, etc.10.
Several Romany associations have shown an
interest to prepare a dictionary of the
Romany language, and to that aim they are
establishing the links with the Romany
NGOs in Croatia and Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia.
6.
The attitude of the state authorities
toward Romanies in Bosnia and Herzegovina
is highly unsatisfactory and it is
manifested both in inadequate attention
to their rights and interests, and in the
frequent violation of their rights on the
part of the state organs themselves.
There were several cases where the
municipal authorities but too readily,
without previously preparing the ground
(if not intentionally so) passed the
decisions to move a great number of
Romany households from particular urban
locations where they had been
traditionally living (Sarajevo,
Zavidovici, Kakanj). In some of such
cases there was no any real justification
for doing that, and the decisions were
not passed in accordance with the
previously defined urban development
plans, and, as a rule, without previously
informing and consulting with the
Romanies to whom this concerned. The new
locations assigned are, as a rule, less
favourable for their living.
In a situation where corruption runs
high in Bosnia and Herzegovina, many data
indicate that the Romanies, especially
those coming back from abroad, are
frequently the victims of it. They
frequently complain that the municipal
bureaucrats ask for bribes in order to
make decisions on their applications and
claims. This relates not only to cases of
repossession of their houses and their
property, or to reconstruction and repair
of their damaged houses, but also to
obtaining any kind of document from the
state organs. It should be noted here
that a great number of Romanies was left
without their personal documents during
the war. The possession of such documents
is a precondition for realising many
rights and entitlements. The municipal
officers are aware of this fact and thus
deliberately procrastinate with issuing
the documents, asking for bribes. This
phenomenon is evident in the territory of
Republika Srpska, but also, according to
our information, in the area of Central
Bosnia and Zenica-Doboj Canton. It is
interesting to mention here that the
Romanies are unwilling to speak about
this, because they are afraid of various
methods of retaliation.
An evident example of the negligence
of the state authorities in regard to the
rights of the Romany population is the
fact that only a small number of the
Romanies makes part of the police forces
in several municipalities. In view of the
express provision of the Constitution of
the BH Federation stating that the
composition of the police forces in each
municipality should be such as to
correspond to the ethnic composition of
the population in its territory, there
are several municipalities where the
police forces should have several
Romanies within the police (Zavidovici,
Kakanj, Visoko), and yet there is not a
single one11.
It is only as of recent that the Romanies
are being taken under consideration when
deliberating on the admission to the
police academies.
7.
During the previous elections in Bosnia
and Herzegovina the Romanies have noticed
that the national political parties are
trying to win their votes by manipulating
with their religious feelings, giving
various promises (which never come true),
making a symbolic show of attention
toward them in the electoral time (which,
as a rule, immediately disappears after
the election) and in many other ways. It
was precisely this that contributed that
many Romanies gave their votes to the
candidates of other political parties
(most frequently to SDP) during the
elections for municipal organs. Because
of this they were threatened, intimidated
and in other ways harassed, even
physically beaten, in some communities12.
We should add that the Romanies are
increasingly mentioning the need to form
their own political party, believing that
this is the only way for them to
participate in the organs of the state.
8.
One of the primary routes to be taken in
improving the situation of the Romany
population in Bosnia and Herzegovina is
to have Romanies themselves get better
organised. There is an increasing
awareness of this with the Romanies
themselves. In spite of all the very
modest results obtained up to now, in
those communities where the associations
of the Romanies did exist, the overall
social treatment of the members of this
people was more favourable. Only after
these associations started springing up,
the present state authorities began to
notice the demands of the Romanies. There
are about 40 of these associations now in
Bosnia and Herzegovina, the majority of
them in the BH Federation.
III
The overall highly difficult situation
of the Romanies in Bosnia and Herzegovina
can be seen as:
- the problem of an attitude toward
the Romanies within the local
communities;
- the need to protect the
rights of the Romanies as an
ethnic community, and
- the need to protect he
rights of the Romanies as equal
citizens in the state in which
they are living.
The elementary preconditions which all
the three aspects share in common is to
enable the Romanies to come back to their
homes and to have their real property
returned to them. Also it is particularly
important that they themselves get better
organised and thus to strengthen and
facilitate the communication among
themselves. In that way they will be able
to start speaking of their problems in a
more efficient way, it will be easier to
provide help for them and better
conditions will be created to establish
the contacts with the authorities
(something that up to now has been far
below the satisfactory level).
The present difficult situation of the
Romanies should also be seen in
connection with their treatment within
the legal system of Bosnia and
Herzegovina. This treatment has up to now
been contradictory and basically
inappropriate. In spite of the impressive
list of the most significant
international documents on human rights
which make the integral part of the
Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina,
attention should be drawn to the fact
that in the normative part of all
thirteen BH Constitutions, the minorities
are being mentioned only in principle and
in broad general terms. The situation
with the legislation of Bosnia and
Herzegovina in this regard is
particularly dissatisfying. The
minorities are mentioned only in few of
the laws, in some of them in a manner
that raises doubts as to whether they are
in harmony with the Constitution.
Therefore the ongoing constitutional
amendments, aimed at treating the
constitutive peoples in a more
appropriate way, should also result in a
more comprehensive constitutional
treatment of national minorities, which
would also offer more guarantees to them,
all the more so since this is an
obligation contained within the accepted
international documents.
Sarajevo, July 2000
FOOTNOTES
1
Only in the
territory of three municipalities –
Bijeljina, Visoko, Kakanj, the number of
the Romanies is higher than the total
number of the Romanies who declared
themselves as such in Bosnia and
Herzegovina during the 1991 census. BACK
2
The Centre
possesses information that the Romanies,
now living in the area of Gorazde and
Livno, are refusing to identify
themselves as members of the Romanies.
Such behaviour can be found in other
areas of both entities as well. BACK
3
Because of
grossly unlawful nature of these cases,
the Centre addressed in writing the Prime
Minister, Minister of Internal Affairs
and Ministry for Refugees and Displaced
Persons of Republika Srpska. Some of the
state bodies have recently moved out of
these houses. BACK
4
Since even some
lawyers took part in such deals (thus
violating the professional code), the
Centre informed of such cases the
Government of RS, Ministry of Internal
Affairs of RS and the Bar Association of
RS, demanding from them to undertake
appropriate measures against such
persons. The Prosecutor with the Bar of
RS informed the Centre that there were no
grounds for establishment of such
responsibility. BACK
5
Examples for
this are Zepce, Jajce, Livno,
municipalities in the western part of
Mostar. BACK
6
There are 1,000
Romanies living in Zavidovici of whom
only two are employed. Not a single one
out of a great number of the Romany
returnees, who had been employed before
the war, was returned to his job. BACK
7
Such instances
were reported in the towns of Jablanica,
Travnik, Bijeljina, Turbe, Kakanj. BACK
8
In this
municipality there is a big and renowned
elementary school the headmaster of which
is a Romany. The latter fact certainly
contributed largely to having a large
percentage of Romany children attending
the school. BACK
9
For Tuzla
Canton it is also characteristic that the
young Romanies express their desire to
obtain the university degrees. Yet the
material status keeps the number of
Romanies studying at university far below
the number of those graduated high-school
students who would like to continue their
education. BACK
10
An illustration
of this is the exhibition of photographs
about the life of Romany refugees from
Bosnia and Herzegovina in Berlin,
organised early last year in the most
representative exhibition hall in
Sarajevo. The great number of Romanies,
not only from Sarajevo, but from other
places from both entities of Bosnia and
Herzegovina as well, visited this
exhibition. BACK
11
The Centre has
addressed in writing the Minister of
Interior of the BH Federation and the
Minister of Interior of Zenica-Doboj
Canton several times on this issue. Not
only that the situation did not change
after this, but they did not even respond
to this notices. The Centre addressed in
writing the Commander of IPTF to the same
purpose, since IPTF is also accountable
for gross violation of express
constitutional provisions. Neither they
responded to such warnings. BACK
12
The Romanies
voted mainly for SDP in Banovici during
the last municipal elections. Because of
this they were physically attacked and
some of them suffered severe bodily
injuries, being knifed. All the evidence
collected in this case by the Centre for
Protection of Minorities’ Rights and
the Helsinki Committee for Human Right in
BH indicate that the municipal
authorities in this municipality (the
Mayor, the Police, the Court, the
Prosecutor’s office) partially sided
with the attackers who committed the
attacks led by political motives. BACK
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