Mustafa
Mustafa was 12 when I met him in 2001. In Kosovo in those days, there was not much to do for a lad like him. So he decided to organize a group of youngsters to work on small social activities in the neighbourhood. It grew to a group of around 10 boys and girls from his school class. They were helping out in people’s homes and gardens, shopping for the elderly, providing basic first aid at festivals and larger meetings. That sort of thing.
When Mustafa visited my office, he wanted to do more. He told me his wish to play football with his old neighbourhood friends now living in the Serbian enclave nearby. In his words: ‘we want to work on our own future, we young people have do nothing with the old history that divides us from our friends. And I am sure that’s the same for the Serb kids.’
I told him I did not have any kind of funds for those kind of activities, but I would be happy to together try and find people who had. And after much ado the football game took place. And basketball. Mustafa surely had a nose for finding the right people to organize the game.
Last year I met him again. He is 20 years old now, over a head taller than I and still active. He and his activist group implement local integration projects. One example would be their project with Roma kids. With financial support of a foreign donor, they support Roma youngsters in finding a job. If a local tradesman expresses his willingness to work with a Roma, they strike a deal with the employer: they provide the full wages for half a year, then half the wages for another half year, and after that the employer has to hire the person. Building relationships over mutual interests.
After a year of implementation, this model has been copied by several local organisations in other towns in Kosovo, not in the least because Mustafa and his friends are activily exchanging ideas as member of a network of local peace organizations.
For me, Mustafa is an example of a real peace worker: locally active, not afraid to try things out, active for a longer stretch of time, a keen eye for mutual interests, but above all with compassion.
