The EAPL Chairman, Member of the European Paliament (MEP) Valdemar Tomaševski said, that during Thursday's coalition meeting number of important decisions were made. Partial coalition agreement on the law on the land return was achieved. More exactly, partners of the ruling majority agreed that the nationalized land will be compensated to its rightful owners as forest.
'The process of land return to its rightful owners is lasting for years. In Vilnius only a small part of land was returned. We have tabled some proposals that may be helpful in completing this process successfully. Coalition partners have already agreed on the possibility of compensating land as forest,' said V. Tomaševski.
The EAPL has already tabled another proposal that would simplify the process of land restitution. The Institute of Agriculture in Trakų Vokė owns a land of 300 hectares but, according to V. Tomaševski, it is very ineffective to locate such an institute in the capital. Tomaševski thinks that the Institute should be transferred to province. 'This way new work places would be created in villages, while Vilnius would add 300 hectares of land that could be divided into plots and used to compensate the land taken away from people,' explained the EAPL Chairman and underlined that the authorities of the Vilnius City self-government support this proposal.
The adoption of the Law on National Minorities was another issue discussed during the meeting.
'The postulates of the representatives of national minorities are not uncommon at all. It is necessary to make sure that national minorities can enjoy their rights commonly provided to European citizens,' said Rita Tamašunienė, Chairwoman of the EAPL political group in the Seimas. As the EAPL representatives assured, coalition partners have agreed that the project to restore the Law of 1991, which has been successfully valid for almost 20 years, will be accepted.
The Chairwoman of the EAPL political group in the Seimas underlined that the spring session in the Seimas is going to be very busy. Members will work on the above mentioned draft laws on land return and on national minorities. Moreover, they will also consider the Law on Employment which would enable people in pre-retirement age to remain active in the labour market. The Seimas will also consider the Law on the Protection of Life in the Prenatal Stage. To add, amendments to the Law on Education were initiated too.
We would like to remind, that the amendments initiated earlier by the EAPL successfully entered into force. First of all, it is the introduction of reduced added value tax rate on tourism services; the positive effects on this economic sector are already seen. EAPL Members have also initiated the increase of funding for local roads in a quarter and additionally in a fifth next year. Thanks to that self-governments have acquired the opportunity to arrange local roads that were in a pitiful state until now.
When asked by journalists about the Law on Education and liquidated reliefs in the examinations for pupils of national minorities' schools, EAPL politicians did not hide their concerns regarding the situation of youth.
'Our youth is being discriminated,' stated V. Tomaševski pointing to the huge differences in program - pupils from schools with the Lithuanian teaching language had 700 hours of the Lithuanian language lessons more than pupils of national minorities' schools.
In turn R. Tamašunienė commented the issue primarily as a mum of a school graduate, who is going to sit the unified exam of the state language without any reliefs despite the fact that the pupil has been learning Lithuanian according to the similar program which her peers from Lithuanian schools have only during the last two years. According to Tamašunienė, both parents and pupils have a huge sense of injustice and inequality now.
Moreover, Chairwoman of the EAPL political group stressed, than currently unified program hits also the pupils of initial school. According to the Member of the Seimas, learning the state language at the level of the native language is a great load for pupils just starting their school and results in Lithuanian language being taught at the expense of other subjects. As R. Tamašunienė said, such situation hinders the development of children while stress experienced by them may have negative effects on their psyche and further acquisition of knowledge.
That is why, according to politicians, it is necessary to immediately adopt amendments to the Law on Education, which currently discriminates pupils of national minorities' schools.
At the end of the press conference MEP Valdemar Tomaševski reminded that his electoral staff has submitted signatures supporting his candidacy for the post of the President of Lithuania to the Central Electoral Commision last Monday. Tomaševski thanked everybody for their support and at the same time invited to sign under the coalitional list of the EAPL and Alliance of Russians in the elections to the European Parliament.
