On 6 September, Karen Zadoyan, the Project Manager of the “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” project and the President of the Armenian Lawyers’ Association, gave personal advice to 7 CSO participants of the Gegharkunik CSO incubator on CSO public policy monitoring and improvement plans in the scope of the “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” project funded by the European Union. The meetings took place both at the ALA regional office and the offices of the advised CSOs.
Deputy Project Manager/Grants Coordinator Artak Saribekyan and Gegharkunik CSO Incubator coordinator Liana Makvetsyan also participated in the working meetings.
During the meetings, Mr Zadoyan spoke about the sub-grants to be allocated to incubator CSOs through competition in the scope of the project, as well as the development of public policy monitoring and improvement plans by the participants themselves, the preparation of a brief executive summary covering the sub-grant project on a single public policy included in the above-mentioned plans.
Representatives of 3 incubator participant CSOs received personal advice at the Gavar office of the Armenian Lawyers’ Association. Then, a visit was made to the office of the “Regional Business Centre” Business Support NGO in Gavar. Here, too, Karen Zadoyan provided personal advice and answered the questions raised.
The following visit was paid to the office of the “Pulse of Community” Youth NGO based in the Vardenik Community. Members and volunteers of the organisation were present at the meeting. Zadoyan gave personal advice to the members of the organisation on how to prepare the organisation’s public policy monitoring and improvement plan and present the problematic policies in a more targeted manner.
The following destination was Sevan where the “Sevan Youth Club” NGO works. Gohar Mnatsakanyan, the NGO President, and other members met the ALA staff at their “Bohem” Studio-Teahouse where they received personal advice and tried to brainstorm the public policies targeted by their organisation. During the meeting, the CSO representatives spoke about the achievements registered due to constructive dialogue. “Sevan Youth Club” NGO President Gohar Mnatsakanyan noted that after their visit to the RA Ministry of Culture in the scope of the CCD project they had received a cooperation proposal and even a small grant from them.
The “Regional Development and Research Centre” NGO works in the Lchashen community, so the members of the organisation received both advice and information on public policy development there.
In addition, Karen Zadoyan gave an interview to the Qyavar TV Company in Gavar, where he spoke about transitional justice and the states where the provisions of transitional justice are mainly applied. He mentioned that the justice administering body will remain the court in this case, too. In order to restore and return the actives stolen from the country as a result of corruption, it is necessary to solve the issues related to the expiration dates of the underlying corruption offences for the stolen actives, as well as those related to the application of the retroactivity of the law, through transitional justice.
The “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” project is implemented with the financial support of the European Union by a Consortium of civil society organisations, which are the Armenian Lawyers’ Association (lead organisation), Agora Central Europe (NGO based in the Czech Republic), the Armenian Centre for Democratic Education-CIVITAS, the International Centre for Human Development, the SME Cooperation Association and the Union of Communities of Armenia.
The project aims to enhance the influence of civil society organisations (CSOs) and CSO coalitions/networks on public policies in Armenia. This will allow organisations that are already working in sectoral coalitions to access additional resources, new groups of civil society experts to come together and to encourage them to place their causes on the local and national policy agenda, to identify common concerns and priorities and approach government bodies with constructive and strategic policy engagement initiatives.
The project will provide sub-grants to CSOs and CSO coalitions for developing public policies and bringing significant changes in the 9 target sectors selected within the project, including those of justice, human rights, public finance management, business, education, and the social sector: social inclusion of children with disabilities, agriculture, economy, and energy.
