Fenomena Supports Female Victims of Violence

Fenomena was founded in Kraljevo by a group of enthusiastic women that attended a lecture about violence against women. They approached BCIF to request support in creating an SOS Hotline and Center that would offer psychological and legal support to women victims of violence. BCIF provided not only financial help, but also a link to the Autonomous Women’s Center (a national women’s NGO). The Center was successfully established and over 20 volunteers were trained to support victims of violence. Volunteers of the Center then started cooperation with the Association of Young Lawyers, which began to provide legal services free of charge.
 
The BCIF grant was used to attract matching funds from two other donors, which supported organizing a workshop for 39 Kraljevo police officers, training that will help them to understand the mechanisms and correct way of reacting to issues of domestic violence. The group’s successful work soon resulted in media support and significantly raised awareness in the community regarding family violence.

At the end of its first year, Center had provided 207 services to 123 victims of domestic violence in Kraljevo, had obtained the full cooperation of the police, and supported prosecution of 14 cases of domestic violence in Kraljevo court.

Despite a positive attitude, however, the Municipality did not provide any concrete support, and  another important institution, the Center for Social Work,  continued to be non-cooperative. After a series of consultations with BCIF staff, Fenomena volunteers were invited to participate in the Advanced Community Advocacy Program. This helped them to develop a project aimed to influence decision-makers (the Mayor and Municipal council) to create a protocol of cooperation among all relevant parties in Kraljevo (Police, the Center for Social Work, the Public Prosecutor’s Office, the Municipal Court, the Health Center and CBOs).

After 7 months of intensive media campaigning, work with authorities, political parties, institutions and citizens, the protocol was signed in August 2008 defining roles and procedures of each partner for prevention as well as responses to cases of domestic violence. Fenomena won third place at the competition for The Best Local Initiative in Serbia in 2007.

In the words of one of Fenomena's volunteers, Aneta Bojovic Ilic, their next ambition is to get authorities to recognize their work in a financial way:

“We got support from two more donors and one private donation, but we didn’t get any finances from the municipal budget although we tried to. We believe that it would be of great importance that local authorities recognize it’s the municipality’s own interest and need to take part in this initiative because this is something of common interest to all the community. We hope to change this situation by placing pressure on local authorities to work transparently when they publish open calls and deliver financial support to CSOs.”