Serbs discriminated in public administration jobs in Croatia

ZAGREB - The Serb Democratic Forum (SDF) warned on Tuesday that discrimination of Serbia and other minorities is still present when it comes to closing employment contracts in public administration.

This is one of the biggest problems in the implementation of the Constitutional law on national minorities' rights and the Action plan for the period from 2011 to 2014, SDF released.

Although the percentage of minorities in public administration bodies has increased slightly, totalling 3.5 percent, this is still considerably less than 5.5 percent envisaged in the Action plan, the release states.

SDF recalled that 2013 was the first year in which a higher number of employment contracts was closed with national minorities than the number of dismissals handed to members of national minorities, and warned that despite all the measures implemented by the Croatian government, the number of people who signed employment contracts in the public administration sector on grounds of public calls totalled as few as 37, out of the total of 624 people commencing employment.

SDF said that the Serb national minority was targeted by extensive discrimination because its members account for as few as 2.8 percent of the total number of employees in the public administration sector, which constitutes a drop compared to 2012, when Serbs employed in the public administration accounted for 2.4 percent of all employees.

It is absurd that the number of Serbs employed in local and regional self-government is reduced by 17 percent relative to 2012, and the data that best indicates their discrimination is the fact that only 38 out of 313 employees hold top management functions.

SDF is not satisfied with the number of Serb employees in...