Common prejudice and discrimination against the Romani in Türkiye are preventing them from integrating into society, according to Ercan Mayaer, the head of Social Innovation at the Movement for Humanity and Civilization (IMH), an association fighting social prejudice.

"Social prejudice stems from the failure of people to recognize one another and the Romani play an active role in many fields but we are still unable to break prejudice against them," Mayaer told Anadolu Agency (AA).

"We must destroy all the prejudice in people’s heads," he said, calling everyone to meet and talk with "anyone who is not one of you."

Mayaer, originally a Bosnian who has lived among the Romani since childhood, himself admitted to struggling to form friendships with them due to his prejudices.

"I only began to get to know them when Romani children invited me to play football with them when I was 15," Mayaer recalled. "At first, I had been very nervous because we were constantly told very negative things about the Romani. They showed me tremendous hospitality; we had tea, we chatted and thus I got rid of all the bad thoughts."

"I’m also an immigrant and our family isn’t prejudiced but some people made up horror stories about the Romani," he said.

For the past 18 years, he has been creating projects to ensure the integration of Romani people into society.

"I have dedicated my life to improving their lives," he stressed.

Mayaer attributes a "therapy-like" quality to the Romani neighborhood of his childhood when he lost his father at age 17 and his brother was subsequently conscripted for military duty, leaving him alone with his mother where the neighborhood protected them.

When the Istanbul municipality launched the urban transformation project in the Fatih district, Mayaer was recruited to work on the project and he fought to make sure the Romani got to benefit from the transformation more.

Pointing to increasing legal changes from 2002 onward that culminated in the 2010 Romani Initiative, Mayaer said the community had been subjected to discrimination in the past; they were not able to report their grievances to authorities since they were not taken seriously nor were they allowed to form their associations.

The Romani used to be lumped in with anarchists, spies and other terrorist groups, Mayaer remarked.

Education and employment pose serious challenges to the Romani community although their situation has improved with a string of projects in recent years. Most Romani citizens work at low-level positions and low-paying jobs due to their limited access to education.

The government has worked to help them access better jobs with better social security and it now seeks to encourage participation in free vocational training courses where participants are automatically employed in public services and private companies once they complete the training.

"President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has worked very hard for the legal changes. The Great Romani Workshop was held in 2009 and the very next year the Romani Initiative took place, which somewhat eased the problems of Romani citizens."

Erdoğan, who spent his childhood in the Kasımpaşa neighborhood of Istanbul where a sizeable Romani community lived, is credited with taking the first steps for affirmative action programs for the community during his tenure as prime minister.

The president was the first to apologize to the community in 2010 for the Turkish state’s past policies depriving the community of their rights. He attends Romani "conventions" that bring together representatives of the community.

In 2016, an action plan was announced as part of his government’s Romani Initiative to improve the living conditions of local Romani people.

Earlier this year in January, the first action plan of a new strategy document covering 2023-2030 took effect, introducing more education, housing, health care, social services and social aid to expand the document’s scope.

Praising the "very important" projects currently undertaken by Romani associations to break prejudices, Mayaer said, "If there is any community that needs to be apologized to, it’s the Romani."

Against "swathes" of discriminatory news against the Romani, Mayaer’s department is working to prevent the marginalization of the Romanis and accommodate citizens to the domain of social life. With the contributions of four public institutions, two universities and IMH, the Social Innovation Department has enabled and continues working to return Romani children aged 10-15 to school.

Educational participation rates among Romanis are much lower compared to other communities, Mayaer stressed.

"We have found that the children of 40 Romani families have dropped out of school due to marginalization and poverty. We have got in touch with these families and made sure their children went back to school," he informed.

The point here is not just the academic success of the child but to keep them away from bad habits and prevent any lapse into neglect by utilizing their free time, Mayaer explained. The department is striving to integrate children back into society by dwelling on their natural tendencies, be it sports or arts, he added.

Thanks to these projects, the Istanbul Governorate has set up a Romani Coordination Bureau and has Romani coordinators in some 28 districts of the metropolis, which Mayaer said has paved the way for comprehensive and sustainable initiatives for the Romani community.

The projects have so far helped increase the rate of Romani children’s participation in school and raised awareness among families, Mayaer informed. "Romani children supported by these projects are providing counsel to Parliament and the Interior Ministry."

The IMH is now working on a new project titled "Kindness Harbor" aimed at prioritizing disadvantaged groups. "We want to develop a network of social kindness and have categorized it as social entrepreneurship, capacity development, volunteering, mutual aid and social policies," Mayaer said.

"In addition to disadvantaged groups, we are working for the integration of addicts, the unemployed, the poor, physically and emotionally abused people, and most importantly, minorities. We both want to encourage people with kindness and produce a more productive system for these groups," he concluded.