Polyparty-ism - Search for Common Ground

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the so-called "women's block" of the
campus dormitory "Stiv Naumov" in
the Skopje district of Avtokomanda.
At the beginning of the crisis there
were 900, mostly Macedonians from
the villages of Tearce, Neproshteno
and Leshok, all from Tetovo region.
There are also a few families from
Arachinovo near Skopje and one
Roma family from the village of
Radusha.
Saddening and uncertain-this is
how we can best describe the fate of
these people. They are predominantly
young people who have recently
established their families and built
their homes. But, as they say, the war
wreaked havoc with their lives and
their fate, and what concerns them
most are their gloomy prospects.
The everyday life of the people in
this shelter is not the most pleasant.
Families consisting
of four or more
people spend the day,
eat and sleep in rooms
of just a few square
meters. There are only
two washing machines
on each floor. The
women line up and
argue about who will
wash the dirty laundry
first. They wait in
lines to go to the toilet.
They have not seen a
warm bath for months,
and these days they
say that they don't get any hot water
in the shelter. They get their meals in
the canteen after they have shown
their coupon. They had been receiving
humanitarian aid on a regular
basis in the past, but now this trickle
has dried up. They don't have any
money because they can't earn it.
Some of them have lost all their property
and their family businesses,
while others lost their jobs. They say
they wait for the Government to help
them mend their lives, to help them
rebuild their houses, to speed up the
economic development in the Tetovo
region and to improve the security situation
in the villages, which they
assert is still very bad.
The displaced Macedonians living
in "Stiv Naumov" are ashamed of
their situation, but they want to
remain anonymous in their contacts
with the media, because they are
afraid. During the crisis those that
spoke publicly about their doom have
suffered because of it.
"Thos who would tell their names
and surnames for the media would
find their houses burned down and
plundered the same day. Forgive us,
but the fear has remained," they say.
The displaced people from the
Tetovo region have not seen their
homes for two years.
"What we are living through is
worse than torture. For a year and a
half we've lived in a hellish nightmare.
It is the same routine every day:
wake up, eat, go to bed. We can't
stand it anymore! The situation in the
shelters is awful. The only thing we
receive on regular basis is the food.
We prefer that we didn't-so that we
could die soon and get rid of the trouble.
Everyone forgot us: the
Government, the Red Cross, the
humanitarian organizations. Before,
they were giving some aid. Now there
is no milk, no detergent, no hygienic
packages, no diapers. And almost
every family has a baby or a small
child. We get one sack of washing
powder a month, and we spend it in a
few days. Only two years ago we
lived comfortably, but now we have
no money. We all had businesses,
good jobs and good salaries," one
man from Neproshteno village conveys
with sorrow.
They live with gloomy prospects.
They say they wait for the day when
they will return the keys of the campus
rooms, pack up and return home.
"Every morning when I wake up
and open my eyes, the first thing I
think of is how to improve my life
and the lives of my wife and children.
I feel hopeless, but I still hope I might
get back to the normal world. I eat
quickly and I go to the city. I run
around from ministry to ministry,
from door to door, from one officer
worker's window to the next. I look
for help of any kind. Alas, it is useless-nobody
wants to hear about some
other man's sorrow. Then I go to
many firms in Skopje and to the green
markets and I try to find some work,
to earn a penny, to earn enough for
milk and diapers, to earn enough to
buy detergent. But work is
hard to find. I come back to
the dormitory sad and
depressed. There, all of us
men gather and tell each
other how we spent the day.
This is my everyday life
since I had to flee my home
village," says a Macedonian
man from Tearce.
While their husbands go
to the ministry buildings and
look for work in Skopje,
their wives run the household
chores "at home."
"I have two small children.
One of them is only three
months old. The room is tiny, but you
have to keep it clean, you have to
wash the clothes. Then I sit inside
these four walls and I cry. I cry all day
long, because I can't stand it anymore.
The health of my children worries me
most, because the level of hygiene is
very low here and we are afraid of
diseases. My older child can't wait to
return to our village. He is not used to
living in a confined space. In Tearce
he was running and playing in the
open and it is withering here. I would
like to go back but I'm afraid. My
husband was a reserve policeman.
Now we are afraid to return because it
only takes once for the worst to hap-
Life on the margins, February 2003