Silent Conflicts Among Ruling Parties

AIM Zagreb, 6 June, 2000

Hardly five months have passed since the parliamentary elections that brought the change of regime, when the Croatian political public started mentioning the possibility of early elections. Such ideas are induced by haggling and strained relations among the ruling six parties. The greatest incentive to such speculations was given by Zdravko Tomac, vice-president of Social Democrats (SDP), the leading party in the six-member ruling coalition. In an interview Tomac threatened: “if our partners in the government”, he said, “continue to act disloyally – we will insist on new elections”.

At the headquarters of Social Democrats, they reacted with reservation, claiming that Tomac's ideas were not authorised in the party. Indeed, their estimate is that brandishing with early elections is harmful for the government because it creates the impression of instability and presents the new regime to the international public as frivolous. But they do not conceal any more that discontent is boiling within their ranks. They publicly claim that their partners are acting incorrectly – they are participating in the government and at the same time publicly criticising the moves of the government. In public the government is perceived as that of SDP. The superior position of this party ensures its domination in decision-making, but when the government makes unpopular moves – the SDP also takes the brunt of negative reactions. To the attempts of disciplining, other members of the ruling coalition respond with stings that it is unacceptable for them to have multipartism transformed into a new Socialist Alliance, so they are trying to increase the small influence they have in the government with the help of the public.

Social Democrats are also fuming because they claim that in allocation of posts they fared worse than their partners. The number of the posts they hold allegedly is not in proportion with their election results. Additional nervousness in this party is caused by results of local elections that have lately taken place which show that they still rank the first, but also that their popularity is dangerously stumbling. In January parliamentary elections, together with the then weakened Croatian Social Liberal Party (HSLS), SDP won about fifty per cent of the votes in Zagreb. Three months later at local elections in Zagreb, it ran independently and won about twenty odd votes. Faced with such a trend, last week the leadership of Racan's party busied itself with a debate on its strategy in the forthcoming period. They declared to the public that there would be no new shuffling of cards. The party will make certain “cosmetic” moves which are expected to improve its image in the public, but it will also make certain demands to its partners.

There remains the part of the problems which refer to increasingly obvious political differences and disagreements among the ruling six. Perhaps this gap became the most obvious in the procedure of passing the law on reconstruction. Racan's cabinet proposed an absolutely democratic law which annulled every evident ethnic discrimination in the right to reconstruction of homes.

The draft new law deleted the division into the Croats and the Serbs, it undertook the same obligation to reconstruct houses destroyed by the Serbs and the Croats in the same manner. The until recently ruling Croat Democratic Community (HDZ) stormed and kicked up a great fuss that this law destroyed the difference between the victim and the aggressor. This party demanded resignation of minister of reconstruction Radimir Cacic who had said that there were persons who had committed arson and crime on both sides. Such a reaction when HDZ is concerned is not at all surprising. However, concerning that draft law the government met with silent boycott even from its own ranks. In three attempts to pass this law there was no quorum in the assembly. Mostly members of the Croatian Social Liberal Party, which is a partner of SDP, were absent, as well as the members of the Croatian Peasants' Party. The needed majority gathered only after the government had introduced certain amendments in the draft law and after it had imposed the obligation on the minister to apply a list of priorities in implementation of the law. These amendments are called Budisa's amendments in the lobbies. Allegedly, it was Racan's strategic partner, Drazen Budisa, leader of HSLS, who insisted on them.

Budisa publicly reproached the prime minister for not having consulted other members of the ruling coalition about the content of the law, so there are opinions that the obstruction was in fact intended as a means to discipline Racan. It is more likely, however, that Budisa's amendments are a sign of his increasingly obvious inclination to the right. Leaders of HSLS have lately insisted on topics which remind greatly of HDZ, and Budisa himself by expressedly bowing at Tudjman's grave emphasised his loyalty to continuity.

A part of SDP is dissatisfied with these excursions to the right, and a part of them have already unofficially declared that their better and more natural partner would be the Croat People's Party (HNS). It is hard to tell to what extent this idea about more intimate connections with HNS, the party of the president of the Republic, Stjepan Mesic, is motivated by political intimacy and to what extent by the fact that this party has suddenly, according to the latest polls, soared up and now ranks second on the list of popularity. Nowadays, HNS is indeed closer to the left than SDP and much more radical in the demands that the process of de-Tudjmanisation be carried out in practice. In comparison with SDP it is in this sense more principled and it is not ready to compromise with the remainders of Tudjman's rule. Professor Zarko Puhovski observes that according to ideology Racan and president Mesic should be much closer than Racan and Budisa, but that in this case methodic closeness and difference are decisive. Racan and Budisa are probably different in their views of the world, but in comprehension of politics they are like Siamese twins. This is how the question of relations inside the ruling coalition and the possible new shuffling of cards appears as the question of the profile of Racan's Social Democrats and as the question of the attitude of new Croatia towards Tudjman's heritage. The destiny of the six-member government – and this is quite certain – is determined by SDP. Scheduling of new elections – and this can be claimed with much confidence – should not be expected. At this moment elections are not convenient for anybody except for HNS, but this party has declared itself against them, although it would probably profit in them. The public would punish anybody who would campaign for new elections. For the time being Croatia is fed up with elections, it now wishes to see election promises fulfilled. Insisting on political regrouping would be, with plenty of sound reason, understood as an expression of impotence of the ruling parties. The public reacts in this way to all the topics which do not refer to the way out of the difficult economic and social crisis. It considers them as idling and a loss of time, a sign of social insensitivity of the political class.

Toying with the idea of early elections is an expression of a fragile state within the ruling parties and it is used as a means for exerting pressure. For the time being there is no alternative to Racan's government in Croatia, there is no other political force which would be capable of forming the administration and everybody is aware of that. This fact may be the reason for certain amount of relaxed behavior among the ruling circles, but objectively, either for them or for Croatia – this is not a happy situation.

Jelena Lovric