Information Note on the Court’s case-law No. 73
March 2005
Skender v. "the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" (dec.) - 62059/00
Decision 10.3.2005 [Section III]
Article 34
Victim
Failure to show status as victim of discrimination: inadmissible
The applicant, a national of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, of Turkish origin, has two daughters. Under the Primary Education Act members of minorities shall have the right to education in their own language but shall also study Macedonian. Whereas under the same law pupils shall attend State primary schools in their place of residence, the primary school in the applicant’s district (Centar Župa) had no Turkish-speaking classes at the outset. In 1996 the applicant’s older daughter therefore attended a primary school in another district, where education in Turkish was being provided. In late 1996 those classes were allegedly interrupted by the police and the school director announced that pupils from other villages were no longer allowed to attend that school.
In 1997 the Ministry of Education and Sport refused the applicant’s request that education in Turkish be provided in his own district. Following a Council of Ministers decision in 1999, however, the Ministry reversed its position and decided to provide education in Turkish in the relevant school for those pupils whose mother tongue was Turkish. In 2000 the Constitutional Court declared these two decisions null and void, finding them unconstitutional. Meanwhile, in 1997, the applicant asked the Turkish-speaking school in the other district to admit his older daughter. The Supreme Court eventually refused to examine the merits of his complaint as it could not be established that a lower instance had received his earlier submission. The Constitutional Court found it had no competence to examine his further complaint.
In 1998 the applicant requested, again in vain, that his younger daughter be enrolled in the Turkish-speaking primary school in the other district. He then applied to the Supreme Court to expand his existing claim concerning his older daughter with complaints concerning his younger daughter. The Supreme Court informed him that it was not possible and requested him to identify and provide, within fifteen days, a copy of the administrative act against which his new claim was directed. It eventually refused to examine his complaint as he had not complied with that time-limit.
The applicant also filed an objection with the Ministry against the refusal of the primary school in the other district to enrol his younger daughter. The Supreme Court eventually dismissed his further complaint on the ground that under the Primary Education Act pupils were assigned to schools in accordance with their place of residence and that he had been informed that his younger daughter had to attend the school in his own district. The Supreme Court further relied on the Constitutional Court’s decision of 2000 annulling the Government’s decisions to provide education in Turkish in his district.
Meanwhile, from September 1999, following the Ministry’s aforementioned decision of that year, children in the primary school in the applicant’s district, including his younger daughter, have nevertheless been provided classes in Turkish.
The applicant complained under Article 14 of the Convention in conjunction with Article 2 of Protocol No. 1 that his younger daughter had been refused access to a Turkish-speaking school on the ground of his place of residence.
The Court recalled that Article 34 does not institute for individuals any actio popularis for the interpretation of the Convention; it does not permit individuals to complain against the state of law or any particular decision in abstracto simply because they consider that it contravenes the Convention. Nor, in principle, does it suffice for an applicant to claim that the mere existence of a law violates his rights under the Convention; it is necessary that the law should have been applied to his detriment. In order to be able to claim to be a victim in such a situation, an applicant must produce reasonable and convincing evidence of the likelihood that a violation affecting him personally will occur; mere suspicion or conjecture is insufficient.
The applicant’s younger daughter had been receiving primary school education in Turkish since 1999, notwithstanding the Constitutional Court’s finding that the provision of such language facilities to children whose mother tongue was Macedonian was contrary to the Constitution. It was therefore not apparent that he could claim that his daughter was a victim of any discrimination in the provision of education from that time. Even assuming that a potential issue were to arise from the allegedly uncertain situation with regard to future provision of classes in Turkish in the applicant’s district, the applicant had not brought before the domestic courts the issue of discriminatory provision of education based on his place of residence. The fact that the applicant’s earlier claim in respect of his older daughter had been unsuccessful on procedural grounds and that the Constitutional Court had ruled unconstitutional the decision to provide Turkish teaching in the school in the applicant’s district, could not be regarded as indicating that an application concerning discrimination in the provision of Turkish-language teaching on grounds of the applicant’s residence would inevitably have been ineffective or incapable of providing redress, thereby exempting the applicant from the requirement to put the substance of his Convention complaints before the appropriate domestic bodies before addressing the Court. In conclusion, the applicant had failed to show that his younger daughter had been a victim of any violation of the provisions invoked or that he had exhausted domestic remedies.
Inadmissible.
© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights
This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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