|
[
December 12
]
[
December 5
]
The TYDEN weekly features an article on the sterilization of Romany
women, who - between 1959 and 1990 - were paid large sums of money
from the communist authorities for letting themselves be sterilized.
This matter had been implemented by three institutions: the Health
ministry, the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs and the
governmental commission for Romany issues. Human rights organizations,
for instance Helsinki Watch, consider the sterilization of Romany
women to be genocide. While under the communist regime Czech women had
problems to get permission for an abortion, and had to pay for it,
TYDEN writes, Romany women had it free of charge, and social workers
from municipal and district authorities recommended them for
sterilization. One of them, in the Most region, used to bring
sandwiches, cigarettes and bananas to Romany women in the hospital.
From the sum obtained by these women, the social worker used to deduct
the debts for the rent, food and for second-hand clothes which she was
selling to Romanies. There was a case when a social worker threatened
a Romany woman that all her chldren be placed in a children's home if
she did not undergo sterilization. While Czech women were paid only
around 2000 crowns for this treatment, Romany women were given 5 to 10
thousand. In all cases, difficulties emerge at present as far as
evidence is concerned. Romany sterilizations are under the
investigation of the Office of Documentation and Investigation of
Communist Crimes. The office has to distinguish where the law was
broken and where it wasn't, as well as if these steps were or were not
in accordance with international charters. This represents a lot of
work, concludes TYDEN, adding that all Romany women, who had been
willing to talk about such an intimate and sensitive theme as their
own sterilization, are convinced that by doing so, the state intended
to limit the Romany population in the then Czechoslovakia.
Arnost Goldflam - a playwright, stage director, film maker and actor
from Brno writes about "Anatomy of a Praguer" in this weeks NEW
PRESENCE magazine. He says that before the Velvet Revolution he was
lucky enough to travel a bit with his theatre company and able to
visit the "West". "When I returned to Prague airport, boarded a bus to
downtown Prague and hopped on the escalator in the metro, I got a
shock. People used to wear lifeless expressions, their eyes riveted to
the ground or staring off into space. Today the faces have changed,
says Goldflam. Prague people have livelier faces, sometimes happier,
sometimes sadder, but above all they seem to have more emotion and
express greater interest in what goes on around them," says Goldflam,
and continues: "Nowadays, Praguers are a bit country bumpkinish in
their behaviour - although they're supposed to be big city people. A
typical Prague citizen is rarely gallant toward women or polite
towards elderly people. Secondly, they are very noisy having a
tendency to loudly hold forth in public places. Prague businessmen are
very self-confident. When they come out to the "countryside", to Brno,
for instance, where I live, they get out of their flashy cars and
strut down the middle of the street. They also think that nothing
goes on outside their city. They imagine a great sea around them
filled with insignificant microorganisms or a largely deserted
landscape. Prague people have suceeded in cramming the historical
parts of their city with bureaucratic offices. The streets off the
main tourist areas are now almost totally deserted in the evenings
because most of the bureaucrats are either off at a reception or
cooling their heels at home in front of a TV station which is
broadcasting an American movie. And so on.... But then, "some of my
best friends are people from Prague." So, this is how people from
other places see Prague residents.
The weekly supplement of MLADA FRONTA DNES brings an article entitled
"We'll always remain loyal" in which he described the role of
politicians' wives. "A sudden fall from the top is traumatic not only
for a man, but also for his wife. Her reactions in that moment can be
fatal for both," says the weekly. Women's behaviour is less drastic
than that of some animals, because they need their husbands later on.
The value of the relationship between man and wife during hard moments
is under ordeal when the man is falling or standing at the brink of an
abyss. While waits in the room next door or whips up an outstanding
dinner at critical moments, the other grabs a microphone and takes to
the streets to defend her husband in a demonstration. It came as no
surprise that when the acting premier found himself in dire straights,
his wife, Livia Klausova did not stay at home. When asked why she
joined the demonstration in front of the House of deputies, she
replied with no traces of hesitation: "Because of my husband. As
always," reports the weekly adding that a man's crisis always exposes
the real value of the couple's relationship.
©
Copyright 1997
Radio Prague All Rights Reserved
Please send us your comments.
RP Home / Radio Prague in English / Press Review
|
