In the period from 26 – 28 June 2014, ESE conducted training in order to strengthen the capacities of civil organizations on several topics related to health and budgets. The training was attended by representatives from several civil organizations from RM that work in the field of promotion of citizen’s health and alleviating the access of different groups of citizens to basic health services in the public health sector. The following organizations participated in the training: LIL from Skopje, CDRIM from Skopje, KHAM from Delcevo, RRC from Skopje, HOPS from Skopje, HERA from Skopje, Moment Plus from Gevgelija, NORA from Skopje, Hemolog from Skopje and ROMA SOS from Prilep. The first training module was organized to introduce the civil organizations with the right to health, social determinants of health, organization of the public health system in RM, budget and budget process on national and local level, financing the health and budget process in health, as well as budget transparency and accountability and access to information of public character. This module is an introduction into the second module of the training where techniques and methodologies for budget monitoring and analysis and public health policies shall be elaborated. The training was conducted by the trainers Borjan Pavlovski, Marija Gelevska and Darko Antik from ESE and Dr Vanco Velinov from the Public Health Institute of RM.

The training was financially supported by the Foundations Open Society New York and the Foundation Open Society Macedonia.

In the period from 17 – 19 June 2014, ESE conducted the training in order to strengthen the capacities of civil organizations regarding the specific needs of women’s health and relevant policies. Representatives from the following Roma partner organizations participated in the training: CDRIM from Suto Orizari, KHAM from Delcevo and LIL from Gorce Petrov. The training on strengthening the capacities in this area was organized so that the partner Roma organizations start to apply the methodology on monitoring the community with regard to the implementation of health services from the program for early detection of malign diseases with special focus on preventive gynecological services for early detection of cervical cancer. Several topics were discussed at the training, such as: gender and specifics of women’s health; social and economic impact on the women’s health; reproductive and sexual health and rights; international documents regarding women’s health; regulations in R. Macedonia that specifically refer to the health and health care for women; most frequent malign diseases on women’s reproductive organs and screening programs for early detection; overview of the Program for early detection of malign diseases of the Ministry of health, as well as findings from the ESE’s monitoring regarding the implementation of this program. On the last day of the training, the organizations conducted a planning process that established the dynamics of work and the need for technical support and coordination by ESE.

The training was financially supported by the Foundations Open Society New York and the Foundation Open Society Macedonia.

In the period from 02-06 June 2014, in Istanbul, ESE held a workshop where together with Debbie Budlender it considered the analyses that refer to different matters of ESE’s interest, and which were prepared with the assistance of monitoring and analysis of budgets from gender perspective.

The analyses referred to matters in the area of women’s reproductive health, immunization of Roma children, unpaid care for severely ill persons and implementation of the strategy for protection from domestic violence for the period from 2008-2011.

ESE started the cooperation with Debbie Budlender in 2013 and will continue in the following years.

On 13.05.2014, at the hotel Solun, ESE  held the regular session of the General Assembly where the materials were reviewed and adopted according to the following items of the agenda: review and adoption of the narrative and financial report on the work of ESE for 2012 and 2013; review and adoption of the Annual program and financial work plan of ESE for 2014 and Work Plan for 2014-2017; review and adoption of the proposed statutory changes and review and adoption of members of the Executive board (fifth composition, 2013-2017).

Based on the need to ensure more efficient and rational performance of the work assignments, several statutory changes were proposed at the session, such as: changes with regard to the person for advocacy and representation of ESE; change in the name of the association; reconciliation of the goals and tasks foreseen in the Statute and the goals and tasks for the current and future work of ESE; changes with regard to the acquisition of voting right of the General Assembly members and changes with regard to the number of members of the Executive board of ESE.

The fifth composition of the members of Executive board of ESE was elected at the general assembly session.  According to the changes in the Statute, the new composition of the executive board consists of five members with four-year mandate from 13.05.2014 to 12.05.2017. The new composition of the Executive board is comprised of the following members: associate Professor Dr Elena Kosevska, Kemal Ismail, Divna Zmejkovsa; Natasa Boskova and assistant Dr Blashko Kasapinov.

All items of the agenda were adopted by the majority of the present members at the General Assembly.

The Association ESE as an organization that continuously works on the improvement of the access to information of public character, opening of budget information at the disposal of public institutions, alleviating and increasing the participation in the public policy creation and promotion of the right to information and participation in Republic of Macedonia, in the period from 07 to 09 May 2014 will participate at the European regional conference of civil organizations and governments in Dublin, Ireland. The conference is organized by the Department of public expenditures of Ireland and represents a regular annual conference for the member states of the initiative for Open Government Partnership. In the period from January to April 2014, ESE took active participation in the process of preparation of the Action plan for Open Government Partnership of R.Macedonia which should be implemented in the period from 2014 to 2016.

See conference program