Minority SafePack Initiative kicks off post-signature strategy for success

The Minority SafePack Initiative (MSPI) has successfully gathered 1.1 million signatures. But in our view this is not the end of the road by far.

One thing was clear for the team behind the Minority SafePack Initiative (MSPI) from the beginning: collecting 1 million signatures is only a step, although a very important one, towards a successful citizens’ initiative.

We believe that 1 million signatures are not only a great achievement but also a great responsibility. This is why we have planned the next steps even before being sure that we would manage to gather the necessary support.

The MSPI was registered by the European Commission following a five-year-long legal fight at the European Court of Justice. This, added to the  limited number of actions taken so far as a result of successful initiatives, made it clear to us that we need a whole strategy in the aftermath of the campaign.

The first thing we were sure we wanted to do was to develop a series of legal proposals on how to put our demands into practice. In October, we held our first expert meeting, which means that professionals from all over Europe are working on a series of legal proposals to be handed to the Commission. In this way, even if these legal acts cannot be considered officially as part of the initiative request, we want to show the Commission that our demands can be put in practice.

The second thing we needed was a decision on the timing. As the European Parliament  election is getting closer, we felt this is not the right moment for handing in statements of support. The Commission’s members are at the end of their mandate and it looks like they have no interest in adopting anything out of the ordinary – especially on a matter as divisive as minority rights.

Fortunately, the Regulation on the European Citizens’ Initiative does not put a deadline on this: after getting the certificates from national authorities indicating the number of validated signatures, you can submit the initiative to the Commission at any time. Together with the Citizens’ Committee, the Federal Union of European Nationalities – FUEN, the organisation which coordinated the European campaign is still trying to get a clear signal from the Commission. Although this is not foreseen in the European Citizens’ Initiative rules, we have asked for a preliminary meeting with them, but if this does not materialise, we are inclined to wait for the new Commission.

In the meantime, we are lobbying as hard as we can. We are aware that minority rights will not be achieved without majority support. This is why we suggest a pact between minorities and majorities to create favourable conditions for linguistic and cultural diversity to thrive, to preserve and promote the identity of the minority communities, to stop their assimilation and to make them feel entirely at home in the territory where they have lived traditionally, to have a say in decisions that affect their lives, and to exercise autonomously their cultural, educational and linguistic rights.

We are contacting political leaders both at the European and national level, parties and candidates running in the European elections. Our goal is to put minority rights on the European agenda. We believe that the upcoming European elections provide the right platform for a debate on autochthonous minority rights, and we want to make sure that we will have the support of the majority of the newly elected European Parliament.

This is how we plan to make the Minority SafePack a truly successful European citizens’ initiative.