Nataša Žagar (Brajdič Slivšek), Krško, 31 years old
Nataša Brajdič Žagar, became the first Roma police officer in Slovenia and Europe. She was portrayed in the movie On Duty. Today she is a Roma language teacher, lectures at home and abroad about (non-)tolerance, communication, values, acceptance of the difference and the situation of the Roma. She dedicates her life to helping the Roma and represents a bright example for them to live differently: to train, to get a profession, to work, but by no means prematurely, at 11, 12, 13 or 15 years. She is employed at the Office for Nationalities of Republic Slovenia and is the mother of three children. She is convinced that the key role has to be played by parents who should regularly send their children to school, as without education Roma will not have a better future. She herself is an example of the integration of Roma into the wider community. Her path was not and still being not easy, so we can only admire her perseverance and determination with which she succeeded, which very few Roma women do.
She was born in a typical Roma family in Brežice and grew up in Drnovo. She spent her childhood and youth more nomadically, with her wider family. Her family emboldened her self-confidence with love to be able to follow her dreams … “My parents and friends encouraged me to finish school and see the world.”
She attended the Roma class at the elementary school Leskovec near Krško. She had problems as a Roma child.
During vocational school, she worked as a waiteress. First regular job was at Association of soft-landing alliance.
Even though Nataša Brajdič, a 22-year-old Roma woman from Krško running for councilor of the municipal council at the 2002 election. The municipality of Krško was one of the seven municipalities that resisted the legal obligation that Roma get their representative in the municipal council. In June 2007, the municipal council of the Krško municipality founed a Council for Coexistence in the Municipality of Krško on the basis of Article 7 of the Law on the Roma Community. At the inaugural session of January 2008, Nataša Brajdič Žagar was elected for President of the Council. She was 8 years president of commission for Roma before.
In 2006, she was the president of the Roma society Chavora in Krško.
Nataša says:”Each child has a dream and it is on us to help them restore their faith and their dream that in life they can do whatever they want.
In my case, my dreams were return to me by my class teacher Marjana Tomšič. She believed in me so much that my dreams became my reality.”
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