Post-Election Serbia: On Razor's Edge

Developments are dramatically accelerating: Slobodan Milosevic is not recognising defeat in presidential elections, Democratic Opposition of Serbia (DOS) refuses to agree to the victory in parliamentary and local elections, citizens' protests and strikes are spreading even in the towns which were the greatest strongholds of the regime, all attempts of international mediation have failed

AIM Podgorica, October 5, 2000

(By AIM correspondent from Belgrade)

In the past week, the citizens' protests and strikes are spreading throughout Serbia like a fire. Daily gatherings in city streets and squares involve, according to agency reports and estimates, at least 300 thousand people. This number is considerably bigger since on October 2, presidential candidate or as supporters address him, president of FR Yugoslavia Vojislav Kostunica set out in his “campaign of gratitude” in the provinces of Serbia. In Gornji Milanovac, town of 23 thousand inhabitants, the welcoming party consisted of ten thousand citizens. “Everybody that could walk came out”, the organisers declared, themselves amazed. Similar scenes were repeated in Cacak and Kragujevac, while in Nis, on October 4, several ten thousand people were waiting for hours for Kostunica's arrival and then – having been informed that the gathering was cancelled because of their guest's unplanned return to Lazarevac, to Kolubara coal-mine – split up in peace. The picture of Vojislav Kostunica who is calmly speaking to the citizens at road blockades, disregarding police cordons, became quite normal.

The resoluteness of the citizens to persist in defence of their will expressed in the elections is most successfully maintained – and intensified - by DOS through consistently keeping the pre-election promise that it would fight to the last vote of those who had instilled their confidence in them. This stand was repeated by Vojislav Kostunica in his open letter to Slobodan Milosevic on October 4 in answer to the regime's “offer” to run in the second round of the elections. “We cannot run in any second round of elections, because by doing it we would become accomplices in the theft of the citizens' vote. The fraud committed in the first round cannot be annulled by the second, fifth or any other round. On the contrary, the fraud would just be deepened and intensified, and I would risk to lose the confidence of the voters” said Kostunica, and added: “We two are just the opposite from each other. I do not know whether you are capable of understanding to what extent I am keen on confidence, to what extent it obliges me and to what extent I am proud of it”.

TACTICS OF TAKING FOREVER: Some time after midnight between September 24 and 25, when the scope of the election defeat of the “marital” coalition of SPS and JUL was becoming increasingly clear, Milosevic's regime has striven to buy time, sometimes panic-stricken. Violating the laws that are in force and its own rules of procedure, Federal Electoral Commission (SIK) kept postponing to the last minute final results of presidential elections, changing along the way even the basic pre-election datum – the number of the voters in the state. Even the numbers published in the Official Gazette were wrongly summed up. Despite pathetically obvious manipulation, SIK proclaimed the result of about 49:41 in favour of Kostunica and therefrom scheduled the second round of presidential elections for October 8.

The complaint that a series of mistakes were made in counting of votes, that in an equally mysterious way the existing votes “disappeared“ and the non-existing votes and polling stations “appeared”, as well as the demand that the minutes of polling committees on the basis of which the Commission had reached its decision be compared with the copies of the minutes DOS had was turned down by the Federal Electoral Commission. The complaint was then sent to the Federal Constitutional Court. In the meantime, a few cases were revealed of destroying large quantities of ballots with Vojislav Kostunica's name circled on them. DOS submitted evidence of a drastic case of destruction of the ballots with the votes of soldiers in a privately owned paper processing enterprise near Cacak.

On Monday, October 2, Slobodan Milosevic decided to address the citizens of Yugoslavia on TV “on the occasion of the second round of presidential elections”, in order to inform them about his “view of the electoral and political circumstances in our country, especially in Serbia”. This “view” was in fact the continuation of pre-election speeches in Berane and New Belgrade in which Milosevic proclaimed that his political opponents were rats, rabbits and hyenas, NATO mercenaries and traitors, of course. According to Milosevic, Vojislav Kostunica is a puppet of Zoran Djindjic who demanded continuation of NATO bombing last year, and he also said that those who call themselves DOS would make Serbia a colony of the West. Dismembered Serbia would be ruled by crime and mafia, a few would get rich and the people would be impoverished, not only financially, but spiritually, too, because they would forget their history, culture, even their own language. To a confused spectator it could have appeared as if the president were describing the consequences of his own rule. The stress in Milosevic's speech – instead on an explanation why he had scheduled elections at all with the opponents who, if not shot, should have been in prison, was on the declaration that “Serbia is not attacked because of Milosevic, but Milosevic is attacked because of Serbia”.

“STRUGGLE FOR KOLUBARA”: The threatening tone of the speech, however, did not make an impression on the opposition and the citizens. That same evening Zoran Djindjic mocked at the Square of the Republic that he was accused by a man who did not dare come out in the street nor address the citizens without a few hundred bodyguards and members of special police units around him. Serious analysts assessed that the speech was in fact addressed to Milosevic's supporters, especially the part of minor activists in the field whose loyalty to the regime was seriously shaken by the obvious election fraud and direct insight into the true disposition of the citizens.

On the other hand, the speech seems to have stimulated the wavering ones to join the citizens' resistance instead to prevent them. Every day a growing number of factories and enterprises were proclaiming that they were on strike demanding just one thing: determination of the true election results. On Thursday October 5, more than one hundred large companies were on strike, including the former giant industries such as chemical industries Nevena from Leskovac and Zorka from Sabac, parts of Bor mining and melting combine, hydro electric power plant in Bajina Basta, Trajal tire factory and chemical factory Merima from Krusevac, parts of Kragujevac Zastava (including the military industries), Pancevo factory of fertilizers and petroleum industries, Electric Company of Serbia Railway transportation between Belgrade and Bar was interrupted, and local blockades of roads interrupted transportation in the country at least for a few hours every day.

The heaviest blow came at the very beginning, on September 29 already, from miners of Kolubara coal strip-mines who supply with coal for Nikola Tesla thermo-electric power plant in Obrenovac. All the attempts failed of local Socialists to end the strike by standard combinations of the stick (sacking, interrogations and arrests), carrot (“we will give you salaries, just name the sum”) and solidarity (Serbia will be left without electric power). The workers were joined by their managers; on October 3, after Milosevic addressed the nation, the government of Serbia reached the decision which proclaims that the strikes were subversion. This had no effect either.

Head of General Staff of the Army of Yugoslavia Nebojsa Pavkovic also paid the miners an unsuccessful visit. He probably relied on the psychological effect of the frightening armoured vehicles escorting him if known solidarity among miners did not succeed – as it did not, since general Pavkovic is a son of a miner from Aleksinac. The demand of the public prosecutor's office that 11 leaders of the strike and two leaders of DOS (Nebojsa Covic and Boris Tadic) be arrested was rejected by investigative judge of the district court in Belgrade Nebojsa Simeunovic. Police cordons consisting at one time of almost one thousand members of special units, just provoked about ten thousand citizens of Lazarevac and Belgrade to join the miners of Kolubara. The regime responded by reducing electric power supply to the population. Also without effect.

Citizens' disobedience was at first marked by the appearance and atmosphere of incessant celebration, at the end of the second week since the elections and before the still unpredictable outcome is characterised by an almost unbelievable mobility of the people. Demonstrations of university students, their energy and inventiveness without doubt contributed to this. The students responded to the police blockade of Kolubara by interrupting traffic on Belgrade-Zagreb highway for several hours, until the police cordon in Lazarevac withdrew. Evident attempts of establishing contact with policemen sometimes succeeded: on October 4, citizens were seen on Slavija square helping policemen remove the garbage containers and flower-stands after the end of everyday blockade of streets. A policeman from the cordon lined across the road leading to Sremcica welcomed a few thousand people from Cukarica by saying: “What took you so long!” The cordon withdrew after that.

In the week of the citizens' uprising several ten students, citizens and activists of DOS were interrogated, arrested and punished for offences. In comparison with the weeks that preceded the elections and in view of the proportions of the protest this is not much. But sociologist Mladen Lazic in his analytical text for Belgrade Media Centre warns that “sporadic repression cannot lead to breaking of a protest of citizens such as this one. A massive use of force would be necessary in order to stop the mass protest, but it is hardly probable that the regime would dare to try anything of the kind. The regime is now using its very well known tactics of small bites trying to cause a large effect with small moves”.

BEYOND LIMITS OF LEGALITY: Lazic stresses that a greater problem is that “there is no possibility for the opposition to deal with completely illegal operation of the regime by legalist means”. The forecasts came true on that very day, October 4, in the evening when after a four-hour public hearing, the Constitutional Court issued a short statement that a part of the appeal submitted by DOS was adopted. Before on Thursday, October 5, this decision was interpreted as annulment of the elections, leaders of the opposition and lawyers of DOS who had participated in the hearing declared that the decision might be “a big trap” (Vojislav Kostunica), that it was “the culmination of cynicism and another fraud of the ruling parties” (Zoran Djindjic), or as lawyer Dragor Hiber said “in fact it means nothing” because it may mean repetition of the first round of the elections, annulment of the elections in Kosovo or return of documentation of the Federal Electoral Commission for new counting.

It seems that Milosevic is inclined to interpret the decision of the Constitutional Court as annulment of the elections and their repetition within “the time limit prescribed by law”. The opposition neither can nor will agree to it, just as it did not agree to any concession to the offers from Greece, Russia and partly Europe to run in the second round of presidential elections. Now that possibility is abolished like every other attempt to resolve the problem – which can be brought down to repeated counting of votes and comparison of reports of polling stations – in institutions of the system. On Thursday, October 5, around noon, while endless columns of people from the whole of Serbia are flowing into Belgrade, with tear-gas and rubber batons the police dispersed groups of citizens who were gathering in front of the building of FR Yugoslavia. Tensions are rising and perhaps it is just a matter of time when an explosion of violence would be provoked, which might be a cause for Milosevic to try to introduce the state of emergency. And that would be the last proof that he has “cracked like a baby rattle”.

Aleksandar Ciric

(AIM)

Entrefilet:

The Latest Information

About one million people from all parts of Serbia gathered in Belgrade streets. A conflict between the police and the citizens broke out in front of the building of the Assembly of Yugoslavia. While this is being written, the citizens have entered the building of the federal assembly a part of which is in flames. The police is joining the people. It is still unknown what will the army do. Groups of soldiers in military vehicles which appeared in the streets of Belgrade are also greeting the people. Vojislav Kostunica, the newly elected president of Yugoslavia has addressed the people. The building of state television is also on fire. The police has also withdrawn from the building of Belgrade TV Studio B. The people are still in the streets, there have been no conflicts, but the freed media are appealing on the people to continue to block the crossroads in the city and remain in front of their buildings. RTV Serbia has interrupted broadcasting. The citizens are in the streets of the towns in the provinces. A decisive night lies ahead.