Litomerice, North Bohemia, Dec 2 (CTK) – Czech real estate agent Eliska Noskova will not appeal a verdict against her for discrimination since her agency refused to rent a flat to a Romany woman over her ethnic origin and she will apologise to her, Free Citizens Party spokeswoman Katerina Kasparova told CTK on Wednesday.
Romany woman Lenka Balogova pretended being interested in a flat, but a representative of the real estate agency rejected her because the owner did not want Romany tenants.
The first-instance court ruled in August that Noskova must apologise to Balogova, but it rejected a 100,000-crown compensation claimed by Balogova.
The extra-parliamentary Free Citizens Party (SSO) actively supported Noskova in her trial. The party opened a bank account for the benefit of Noskova in case the court ruled that she had to pay the compensation.
“It was published that both lawyers have agreed and withdrawn their appeals,” Kasparova said.
“The real estate agent will apologise to the Romany woman. The verdict has taken effect,” she added.
The dispute dates back to 2013 when the Ombudsman’s Office was testing the willingness of North Bohemian real estate agencies to rent flats to Romanies.
The Ombudsman’s Office cooperated with the Counselling Centre for Citizenship, Civil and Human Rights that was checking the approach of real estate agencies to Romanies on the basis of a contract with the ombudsman.
Then ombudsman Pavel Varvarovsky wanted to look into the case of real estate agents who refused to mediate rental housing to Romanies saying the flat owners did not wish it.
The court did not agree with the demanded financial compensation due to the form of testing.
The court ordered Noskova to make a specific apology.
“You were told by a person acting on behalf of my firm that you cannot try to rent a flat in a street in Lovosice (north Bohemia), because you are of Romany ethnic origin,” the mandatory apology says.
“This conduct exposed you to direct discrimination over ethnic origin in the access to housing. I apologise to you for this conduct,” it adds.
Noskova must send the apology to Balogova within three days of the ruling coming into force.
