University in the Gutter

AIM Zagreb, October 22, 2000

The new school year at the Zagreb University started rather stormily. Only a few days after its beginning, the public finally learned about the findings of the State Auditing Service about last year's business operations of the Students' Centre (SC) which revealed shameless plundering of students and pilferage of students restaurants service which they paid much above the normal prices. These were followed by the data on the preferential distribution of places in student hostels and the continued old feud between the (new) Minister of Science and (old) President of the Zagreb University, which all culminated with the possible closure of the department of Croatian Studies since its professors are no longer allowed to teach.

If we mention here a quarrel over the new draft law on institutions of higher education and a series of falsified diplomas, as well as master's and doctoral theses and the refusal of the Zagreb Music Academy to enrol two exceptional flute-players with Vienna University diplomas - it could be said that higher education in Croatia was never embarrassed by more scandals.

Although the Students' Centre of the Zagreb University has been under public scrutiny for some time because of numerous personnel changes which were carried out according to political suitability criterion, only the findings of the State Auditing Service have shown what were the true reasons for these changes. Namely, the Students' Centre is an organisation in charge of the accommodation, feeding, occasional odd jobs and numerous cultural activities of students - from publishing to concerts, theatre performances, exhibitions and film shows. Although thorough HDZ verification of SC personnel was carried out already in early nineties, the process of appointing suitable men to the Centre's management was completed only two years ago when the last man who was not in line with the proclaimed values of Tudjman's and HDZ regime was thrown our from this institution.

This is how it looks like in practice: present SC management was organised in the Presidential Palace with the assistance of no one else but the adviser of the late president Tudjman, omnipresent Ivica Pasalic. The majority of its members belong to the rigid HDZ right wing, some to the pro-fascist press, the alleged cultural weekly "The Croatian Letter", and some even once belonged to political emigration and the clergy (one of the priests was in charge of organising cultural activities within SC). Such personnel structure has erased all traces of student autonomy, cancelling cooperation with a number of editorial offices of the papers that were published as part of the SC's publishing activities. In the end these newspapers were expelled from the Students' Centre and found publishers among non-governmental organisations dealing with youth.

The Students' Centre management did not stop at this. Wanting to secure full control over students they did not shrink from including the SC security services in their foul tricks, including the HSP President and member of Parliament, Anto Djapic himself.

Djapic offered to SC management several of his "boys", members of his obscure party, who in this way got a nice meal ticket as security staff, actually working among students and channelling their political inclinations in the right direction. They found support among numerous students who had illegally secured their place in student hostels and whose way of life would be threatened by every disclosure of irregularities. It is therefore not surprising that during all ten years of HDZ's rule and general instrumentalisation of the University, not a single serious student protest was organised.

And while students were pacified on the one side, those same students, as well as the state, were being ruthlessly robbed on the other. It has been known for some time that Tudjman's younger son Stjepan was making a fortune on the procurement of foodstuffs for student restaurants and numerous canteens which work in hostels and at faculties.

The control carried out by the State Auditing Service revealed that Stjepan Tudjman, i.e. his shareholding company "Domovina" (Homeland) was selected as caterer although its bid was much higher than those of other suppliers. Moreover, despite his high prices, the Students' Centre paid him much more than the agreed amount. Incidentally, running of the Students' Centre costs several dozen million German marks annually, and such high amounts offer an excellent opportunity for numerous financial shady deals, with food as just one of its parts.

Findings of the State Auditing Service came precisely at the moment when the Students' Centre was to get the permission from the Minister of Science to raise the prices of its restaurant services. The Minister, Hrvoje Kraljevic, who faced with these auditing findings withdrew the approved price increase, handed over the auditing findings to the financal police and MUP (Ministry of the Interior) demanding adequate sanctions for those in charge. Since troubles come double, the SC management immediately accused the Minister of illegal distribution of places in student hostels and published the whole story corroborated by witnesses and their statements in the papers, especially those for student population, if anything like that can be said to exist, which immediately sided with the management. According to them, Kraljevic had placed as many as 753 students in hostels disregarding the procedure and the set criteria.

Minister of Science felt very well on his own back how good are the connections between the University and SC management. Soon after SC planted the story about his illegal hostel accommodation of students, University Senate in Zagreb threw him out from its session.

According to University President, Branko Jeren, the Senate brought a decision that sessions would no longer be open to the public (even to the press) and that only invited guests would be allowed to attend. Atits most recent, extraordinary session the new Law on Institutions of Higher Education was on the agenda, but Jeren did not allow Minister Kraljevic to attend the session nor did he comment on the draft law, although it was criticised by all sides - professors, students and the Union. While explaining to the press that he was throwing them out because they were disturbing the Senate sessions, to Minister Kraljevic President Jeren simply said that he had not been invited and therefore could not attend the session.

That Minister Kraljevic truly is no "holy cow" was confirmed by events that ensued at the Department of Croatian Studies, an institution founded within the University at the open insistence of the late Tudjman, who wanted students to study the "Croatian history", "Croatian literature", "Croatian philosophy", Croatian psychology", etc. Already during the enrolment of students in this school year a quarrel broke out between President's Office and the Minister. Namely, the President's Office wanted to discontinue some studies, but the Department of Croatian Studies was given Minister's permission to continue the enrolment of first year students according to the same plan as before. Since the majority of teaching staff at the Department of Croatian Studies come from the Faculty of Philosophy, Neven Budak brought a decision on prohibiting professors of the Faculty of Philosophy to teach at the "competitive department" with a possibility of being dismissed from their principal department without the required approval. Now the entire Croatian Studies Department and the future of its 2,000 students have been called into question although the competent authorities at the Department claim that the instruction will proceed without interruptions.

These days the papers are filled with stories about numerous fake diplomas of state and local public servants. False graduate lawyers, traffic engineers and economists were employed in the Federal Tax Office, Zagreb City Government and the Ministry of the Interior, etc.

At the same time, there are serious arguments at the Faculty of Law in Zagreb, as to what could be considered quoting of somebody else's work and what simple plagiarisation because it has been revealed that many maters and doctors of science have simply copied their master's and doctoral theses from foreign books and publications without citing their sources. Just like the mentioned Ante Djapic, who simply copied his master's thesis from his own party member, who was in return appointed member of Parliament.

With a series of scandals which have been filling the papers recently, higher education in Croatia has only shown the depth of the crisis in the society as a whole, which HDZ left in its wake. For the time being no one is in prison, but financial control and internal auditing services have their hands full. Partly due to their incompetence and partly because of intentional obstruction, majority of efforts aimed at bringing things in order have mostly come to an ignominious end or failed without anyone even asking why. Recently, the renown writer Miljenko Jergovic said that the new authorities were benevolently treating the heritage of Tudjman's regime. However, if the University and students, victims of that same heritage, do not get rid of it, the crisis of all segments of the society might last much longer, even longer than the presently ruling coalition.

Milivoj Djilas

(AIM)