Life in Interregnum

Less than a month of post-election interregnum in Serbia is marked by a drastic decline of the standard of living, economic instability and obstruction of the former regime which has emptied both the state cash box and warehouses with food supplies

AIM Belgrade, October 26, 2000

The decade long aspiration of the major part of international community and the local opposition to remove Slobodan Milosevic from power in Yugoslavia has been achieved, but the events which took place immediately afterwards show that the changes have surprised them. Yugoslavia thus found itself in an interregnum in which a disastrous regime has gone and a different administration still has not been promoted. Consequences of the slow establishment of democratic authorities are manifested everyday through the wish of the overthrown regime to transfer the chaos from the streets which ruled on October 5 into institutions of the system with unforeseeable duration. The most suitable ground for that is further decline of the standard of living. Uncontrolled rise of prices is the result of such efforts and if it is not recognised what has brought it about a wrong picture might be created in the public that everything is the result of the change of the regime. The previous regime counts on it, so it is waging its campaign at the expense of the citizens with the intention to blame the new authorities for the created situation.

Unlike democratic countries in which power is gradually taken over, according to a prescribed procedure, the circumstances in Yugoslavia dictated a different practice. There were two possibilities. According to one, enormous discontent of the people should have been used for a revolutionary change of the regime, and according to the other, the overthrow that had begun in the street should have transformed into a democratic takeover of power. The developments show that actually a third road was chosen which was in fact a combination of the two methods applied primarily in order to avoid loss of human lives.

However, a certain price has to be paid, especially because the situation Yugoslav institutions are in is extremely complex because of undefined relations between Serbia and Montenegro, and because of dilapidation of the existing regime inside Serbia. The burden of unsettled relations is mostly born by the citizens who are, on the one hand, exposed to a wave of drastic rise of prices of the basic foodstuffs, and on the other deprived of normal electric power supply and heating, as the most acute needs, while the list of other forms of deprivation is quite long. According to the estimates of economic experts only in October, inflation has increased by 6.8 per cent. The imbalance between low income and high living expenses has led most of the Yugoslav population into an exceptionally difficult financial situation. The rise of prices followed each other at immense speed: bread, milk, meat, oil, sugar, flour, have become unattainable for a large number of citizens.

Defects which are a consequence of many years of application of command economy created a imbalance among the prices of various products which is expected to be removed overnight by the effect of the market. After its defeat in the elections, the old regime withdrew mechanisms for control of prices considering them its accomplishment which it had no intention to let the new authorities “benefit” from and the latter still have no instruments for pursuing economic policy.

Economic Institute in Belgrade estimates that the future administration on the federal and the Republican level has two possibilities to eliminate the existing disparity. One of them is gradual elimination of the imbalance, and the other recommends a quicker way which would be carried out by letting the market establish a more balanced ratio. The former makes it easier to bear the rise of prices, but the recovery of the economy would take a long time. The Institute declared itself in favour of the latter possibility, that is of accelerated elimination of disparity. Its practical implementation requires great self-denial of the majority of the population.

The implementation of the quicker possibility, according to estimates of this Institute, will cause inflation of about 80 per cent in the last three months of this year. This more efficient “cut” inevitably leads towards big social shocks in case it is not supported by an adequate social program. The estimate is that about 30 per cent of the population in Serbia should be included in a welfare program. Serbia has no money with which it would finance social welfare which was until now offered thanks to burdening the economy.

The citizens of Serbia are, therefore, nowadays in the position of the greatest beggars in the world, who see the possibility to survive in donations of world benefactors. In order to win confidence in the elections, the former regime emptied warehouses with the basic foodstuffs (flour, oil, sugar) and spent the money from funds. Even salaries for the employees of the police were paid with delay. Those who have won confidence of the electorate are not yet organised on the necessary level in order to carry out a painless change of the regime.

The rise of prices of food, cuts of electric power supply, due to which one third of the population is up to eight hours without electricity and heating, are just the first wave of difficulties which the citizens are faced with in the period until this country raises production which will enable meeting of the basic needs. Increased living expenses and difficulties with electric power supply and heating are not the result of the change of the regime. Connoisseurs assess that the situation in the country would have been even worse if the change had not taken place because the former regime could not count on foreign aid which is nowadays being offered to the winners of the elections from all over the world.

The citizens are suffering because the election campaign for the forthcoming parliamentary elections is not waged at rallies and by means of posters, but by aggravating living conditions in order to show that the former regime was better. Unlike the Radicals who are openly obstructing the change, the leadership of the Socialist Party of Serbia has chosen the tactics of public support of quick resolution of the political crisis and destructive action in the economic field. The intention is to create the impression in public that the already difficult living conditions have additionally drastically been aggravated by the arrival of the new authorities and which put the latter in front of a great challenge. The pre-election promises that economic recovery would begin when Milosevic left have not been forgotten. The way to recovery of the economy, however, leads through difficulties and self-denial. Perhaps the Economic Institute is right when it proposes the quicker and the more drastic possibility, but the question that arises is whether it is possible to win December elections with it.

Ratomir Petkovic

(AIM)