The accurate data for an issue or a phenomenon highlights the real condition. Without a doubt, we cannot talk about any topic without having the condition examined. From the post-war period until now, local and international institutions, as well as, non-governmental organizations provide statistics on various issues. It’s the same for girls and women who are active in the labor market, as well as for those who are unemployed. Every time that it’s talked about the possibility and impossibility of women to work, we hit each other with numbers. This happens every single time that it’s spoken about it.

But, to go beyond numbers is difficult. Reasons why the situation is like that, are also discussed. Sometimes, proposals are given for the steps to be taken, and strategies are drawn up, but the situation doesn’t change. Or it changes quite a bit, with the steps of a sleepy turtle. The mindset, mainly of men, affects women not to take steps in their careers. “It is not a job for women”, is a frequent phrase in our environments. It sometimes favors women, too. They take it as caring for them. But, in cases when they take steps forward, they prove the opposite. Oftentimes, both sides realize they are wrong.

On a cold day in February, not too far from Cologne, Germany, we were getting ready to go to the ski town of Winterberg. Filloreta (my sister) just before closing the door of the house, received a phone call. The water supply team, that my sister had called a few days ago, was coming. I personally didn’t care at all what they were fixing. While I was standing in front of the TV, she informed me that they will finish in five minutes and we will leave. Out of curiosity, I slightly opened the bathroom door where the team was. A six-foot-tall man of foal age was standing, checking some pipes. Below the tub, I just saw the feet in the workmen’s shoes. The rest of the body was out of sight as it was under the tub, and I got out. After a few minutes, the man and a woman came out of the house, and there I found out that she was lying under the bathtub. Out of curiosity, I realized that they were a Serbian couple who work as plumbers in that German region. They couldn’t keep up with the work due to the many requests they received.

The Balkans is constantly a place of contrasts. A few years ago, some archeology students were graduating from the Faculty of Philosophy. It was about basic studies. A student had her boyfriend’s family with her. After the ceremony, everyone was congratulating the graduates. After the congratulations, the potential father-in-law of the student released a comment: “This is hard work for women.” According to him, archeology is hard work for women. The environment consisted of several archaeologists, professors, and historians. So, at least five doctors of science in this field were there. But no one spoke. The potential father-in-law gave his opinion. Others probably disagreed in their own minds, but the silence spoke otherwise. And all this happened in a university, where under normal conditions it was not expected.

Statistics would help us to see progress after working to change this mindset. Not only to find out, every year that we are bad. But, while the most bullied deputy of the Assembly of Kosovo, bullies the president of the state, there are hardly any ideas, strategies, and platforms that touch the main node of the silent potential – unemployed women.

Institutions seem to work to make “ticks” in reports. So many MPs according to the gender quota and there is a “tick”. So many women in such and such commission, as the law requires, even there a “tic” and so on. Until the youngest country in Europe, with a high trend of migration, does not turn its eyes to the silent potential, the development will not take off in any field. It should go beyond the numbers. It should touch the mindset.

This editorial was written as part of the Tuesday Salon organized by Democracy for Development, which was supported by the Swedish Embassy, ​​Community Development Fund – CDF, and Human Rightivism.