MEETING WITH THE AMBASSADOR OF THE KINGDOM OF BELGIUM ANNICK VAN KALSTER

4/5/2013

Van Kalster said she would explore all possibilities for trade union cooperation

Today the Federation of Trade Unions of Macedonia was visited by Her Excellency Ambassador of Belgium in Sofia Annick Van Kalster, who spoke with SSM representatives: President Dr. Zivko Mitrevski, secretary of the Council of SSM Angelko Angelkovski Lidia Naskovska, adviser on projects and EU integration and Slobodan Trendafilov, head of departments of SSM.

At the meeting was discussed on the possibilities of cooperation of SSM with the trade unions in Belgium in the use of European funds and other forms of cooperation.

President Dr. Zivko Mitrevski explains the role of SSM in socio-economic life of the country

President Zivko Mitrevski explained that SSM is vitally interested and seeks to contribute in all the processes of integration of Macedonia into the European Union. He introduced the guest to the achievements of SSM from 2010 to date.
For us historical traditions of the labor movement in Belgium and developed social dialogue are especially important, and so is the fact that Brussels is the center of the European Union. It is not about strikes and protests, but about creation of social dialogue and methods of action of the unions, said Mitrevski.

President Mitrevski informed the guest about the participation of SSM in country's European integrations through the participation in the National Council for EU Integration, important body related to the creation of labor legislation. Through the National Council we monitor all activities of the state in this regard.

The engagement of the trade union is perceived in the fact that in two years 19 European Directives were implemented, 5 ILO Conventions are ratified and initiative was started of ratification of 3 other conventions. The Ambassador was also informed about the situation in the collective bargaining, the Law on mobbing and general methods of action of SSM. Mitrevski explained that Macedonia must take account of the fact that political ideology is more dominant than the social and therefore we need to be very careful that SSM remains independent organization. The President reminded on the move of the previous leadership, when taking the side of an political party caused division in the labor movement in Macedonia.

Van Kalster and Zivko Mitrevski, PhD: SSM is very interested in EU integration of Macedonia

Ambassador Van Kalster asked about SSM’s participation in European projects. She emphasized that there is interest from both parties, both SSM and Belgian trade unions, for development of cooperation. She also informed that Belgium has developed cooperation between the three national trade union centers (Christian-Democratic, Socialist and liberal) who, as in Macedonia, have signed a Memorandum of Understanding. There is person in charge to examine which areas of cooperation would be interesting to SSM.

Special topic of conversation was the access to European funds, and President Mitrevski explained that the EU funds distribution is quite problematic. Sometimes huge funds are being allocated to NGOs with only a few members and low capacity, for trade union and social issues, while SSM is bypassed.

Ambassador Van Klasten said that despite this problem, they will examine specific forms of cooperation of unions in both countries.