The Situation of the Education of Romani Children in Albania
In the Albanian territory, side by side with the Albanians, live other ethnic groups as well, such as: Greeks, Macedonians, Montenegrins, Vlacs, Romas and Gypsies. The Census of the Albanian Population of 1989, showed that non-Albanian ethnic groups used to represent approximately 2 percent of the population (Annual Report 1990, Tirana, 1991). The later independent researches supported the idea that these groups represented 5 percent of the population in Albania (B rxolli A., Minorities in Albania, Tirana 2005, p. 19-24). The last national Census in 2011 has shown that the total number of the Roma community in the country is 8301 persons or 0.30 percent of the population. As the history has witnessed, the Proclamation of the Independence of Albania in 1912 was followed with a relatively good treatment of Roma community (ERRC, Roma in Albania, An Unknown Case, 1997, p.56), although the social gap between Romas and non-Romas continued to exist (Koinova M., Minorities in Southeast Europe, 1999, p.135). During WWII, approximately half million of Romanis from different countries in Europe were executed or killed in nazi camps (Ringold D., Orenstein M.A., Wilkens E., Roma in an Expanding Europe: Breaking the Poverty Cycle, A World Bank Study, Washington D.C., 2003). While in Albania, the survival of Romanis was relatively better due to the fact that in the country was not built any concentration camp and did not occur any ethnic cleansing (Ringold D., Orenstein M.A., Wilkens E., Roma in an Expanding Europe: Breaking the Poverty Cycle, A World Bank Study, Washington D.C., 2003). Meanwhile, a lot of Romani people actively participated in the National War for Liberation side by side with the partisans. During the socialist regime (1945-1990), living conditions of Roma community had visibly improved regarding the housing, education, medical care and social services. As the majority of the population, Romanis enjoyed full right to work, although most of them used to work as unqualified workers (Fonseca I., Among the Gypsies, The New Yorker, 25 September 1995). In rural areas, they used to work in the agriculture sector. In urban areas, Romanis used to work in construction, public services and handcrafts (Taho B., Document on the Situation of Roma in Albania, 2002). The adaption of the Constitution of 1976 banned the private economic activities and any private activity was charged by law. Despite this fact, many Romanis continued with their small capacities in trading (De Soto H. et al., Roma and Egyptians in Albania: From social exlusion to social inclusion, 2005), which included bartering horses, the handcraft goods and other products that they bought in the sities and sold in the villages or vice-versa, thus playing the role of the intermediator in trading between rural and urban areas (Courthiade M., Duka J., A Social and Historical Profile of the Romanis in Albania in 1990s. A draft paper provided by the authors). The inclusion in this informal activities provided them suplementary incomes and marked the difference with the other communities in the country. Consequently, their economic status experienced relative improvements. During the period of the post-socialist transition, the colapse and closure of the state owned enterprises, as well as the onesided character of Romani professional abilities, including their low level of the education and their discrimination, transformed their status from a relative welfare to an extreme poverty. Currently, they are the poorest and most marginalised ethnic group in Albania (De Soto H. and Gedeshi I., Dimension of Romani Poverty in Albania, in ERRC Roma Rights Newsletter, No. 1/2002.) Also available at: http://lists.errc.org/rr_nr1_2002/noteb3.shtml).