More than a thousand people gathered on Tuesday evening in the protest of mothers of three or more children who have been on strike in front of the Parliament for 20 days. The mothers protest because their allowances have been reduced from €336 and €196 to €264 and €144 respectively.
Female MPs from Democratic Front (DF), Social Democratic Party (SDP), URA Civic Movement, Demos, Democrats and Socialist People’s Party (SNP) came to the protest, as well as representatives of trade unions and NGOs.
DF MP Marina Jocic said it was a political protest.
“I invite all of you – politicians and NGOs – to put an end to this evil that has befallen us… Neither the government nor the courts belong to people – they are anti-people institutions. And when we come to power, I will push to amend the spelling rules for you. The word mother will be written with a capital letter,” Jocic said.
Ivanka Otasevic, a mother from Cetinje, pointed out that not only the opposition representatives were at their rally.
“There are your members (DPS) here as well,” she said.
Democrats MP Valentina Minic said she did not come to the protest as a politician, but as a daughter and a doctor.
“I call on the minister of health (Kenan Hrapovic), which is the only health minister who does not care for mothers’ health, to address the organised criminal group in the top authorities and explain them what it means when mothers are starving for eight days and eight nights and to warn them to the possible tragic outcome,” said Minic.
According to the organisers, the biggest surprise of the rally was the arrival of SDP MP Draginja Vuksanovic.
She urged fellow lawyers to “restudy the theory of acquired rights”.
“Someone may like this law and someone not, but it got majority support in the Parliament and was signed by the president. Nobody may suspend your acquired rights. Do they understand their own language? Do they know the meaning of the term lifelong allowance? Since they attacked mothers and women, I would like to remind them that the Montenegrin women defended their homes, fought for their husbands, brothers and children. Now we tell them – we’ll not give you our children,” she said.
Vuksanovic also reminded the government that the tax debt amounted to €850m.
“When they collect the taxes, there will be enough money for mothers of one or two children too, as well as for the health care, culture and sports. Mafia, give us our money back,” said Vuksanovic.
DF MP Branka Bosnjak said that there were certain deficiencies in the law.
“A huge number of people are on the brink of starvation. The law supports the women who are victims of transition. I hope this is the first female uprising in Montenegro. I hope that women will prove to be bolder and more persistent than men and let them join us,” said Bosnjak.
Demos MP Anka Vukicevic said that there were pensioners among the mothers who could not live on their pensions, as well as women who had been registered in the Employment Agency for years and found a job.“Jobs were given to someone who was more important, someone who knew people who could employ them and we had no one to do that for us… If they saved resources that Montenegro had, there would be no need either for allowances or for mothers’ protest,” she said. 
“They were spending €30m for ‘consulting services’. How many millions were spent for 28 years, how many thousands of jobs were wasted where we could have worked? … There are room and bread for all of us in Montenegro. We lack only the rights and justice,” said Vukicevic.
