The issue of integrating members of the Roma community into society will be among the priorities of the programming period 2014 to 2020, stated spokesman for the European Commission Representation in Slovakia Andrej Kralik. How much money from EU structural funds in the coming programming period will be made available to projects tackling this issue is uncertain for now. According to Kralik, Slovakia and the European Commission (EC) are intensively discussing this matter and the EC wants to primarily examine the comprehensive strategy prepared by the Slovak side, which should clearly define what goals and how Slovakia wants to achieve them by 2020.
The European Commission wants our strategy to be based on tested projects with tangible results. At the same time, Slovakia should identify barriers to effective drawing of EU funds that were earmarked for the area. The EC perceives the question of which ministries will implement this strategy as secondary. The daily Pravda reported earlier this week on the fact that Slovakia should get more finances than in the previous programming period, totalling about the €300 million. As the Plenipotentiary for Roma Communities Peter Pollak reiterated, the European money intended to help the Roma was spent on many things, however not in a way that the Roma themselves needed. This time he wants to adjust the system of drawing funds to be more targeted and monitor the projects more consistently.
Katarína Richterová
