Serbia and Montenegro

Platform vs. Platform

It is still uncertain when serious negotiations could start on proposals of Belgrade and Podgorica for the future arrangement of relations, nor who would participate in them, and the present political disposition does not raise high hopes for a compromise

AIM Belgrade, January 13, 2001

"There is practically no similarity between the proposal of Belgrade and that of Podgorica on the arrangement of relations between the two republics", declared Slobodan Samardzic, advisor of Vojislav Kostunica, immediately after publication of the platform on Constitutional reconstruction of the federal state signed by the President of Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Official Podgorica does not wish to have any form of a joint state, while in the Palace of the Federation in Belgrade the opinion prevails that a minimum union is more reasonable than total split. Just before the New Year, the Government of Montenegro published its proposal for termination of the state of Yugoslavia, according to which after both republics became independent some joint affairs would (maybe) be established. Kostunica's proposal which promotes a "functional federation" was made public on January 11, after consultations with the future prime minister of Serbia Zoran Djindjic, but it still awaits to be approved by the Presidency of the ruling Democratic Opposition of Serbia (DOS).

It is still uncertain when serious negotiations could be initiated on the offered documents and who would participate in them, but the current political disposition does not raise much hope for a compromise.

The essential difference lies in the fact that in the Montenegrin proposal – which is much more radical than the one offered at the time of the rule of Slobodan Milosevic – it is demanded that both republics be independent, internationally recognised states, while Kostunica speaks of a federal state as an international subject. As reasons for preservation and reconstitution of the joint state of Serbia and Montenegro, the President of FRY stated historical connections, language and tradition, religion and culture, kinship and property links, the citizens who have the citizenship of one republic and are residents in the other, united economic territory, common development interests, and common security interests. Kostunica, an expert for constitutional law, believes that the problem of big disproportion between the two republics which nowadays form the FRY can be resolved with a federal state which will maintain the minimum number of functions on the federal level and in which the federal and the republican state institutions will cooperate in both decision-making and carrying out the common functions.

“Minimum jurisdiction that a state must have if it is strategically oriented towards European integration” is according to this document, protection of fundamental rights and freedoms, foreign policy, national defence, principles of the economic system, transportation and communications. When speaking of the administration in a possible future common state, Kostunica proposes “a system of multiple balance”, that is, a two-chamber federal parliament and the president of the Republic who would also be the president of the Supreme Defence Council. The president would be elected by the federal assembly, and there would also be a chancellor-type federal government. According to the proposal from Podgorica, Serbia and Montenegro would have their own armies and independently one from the other they would form their diplomatic representative bodies.

The first political reactions to Kostunica's proposal in Serbia indicate a matrix which can be expected in the following sequences of the story on Serbia and Montenegro. His immediate associates immediately welcomed the platform: Dragoljub Micunovic, President of the Democratic Centre and Chairman of the Federal Assembly, assessed that this was “a big offer” because it contains “positive discrimination” in order to establish equality of the two republics. The Civic Alliance of Serbia (headed by the Yugoslav foreign minister Goran Svilanovic) also supported the proposal noting that DOS would discuss it, as did the Christian Democratic Party of Serbia (the president of which, Vladan Batic, will most probably be the minister of justice in the future government of Zoran Djindjic).

The Chairman of the Assembly of Voivodina and one of the leaders of DOS, Nenad Canak, however, unexpectedly sharply criticised the Belgrade platform. “It is not a platform, but an opinion which I would not attribute great significance to”, said Canak to Beta agency, adding that never in history had a two-member federation survived and that it was “completely uninventive” to establish such a federal state when the so-called FRY actually consists of “four former federal units of former SFRY, and this should be taken into account”. He concluded that it was necessary to define relations within FRY, and not between Serbia and Montenegro, or else it would be a continuation of Milosevic's unitarian policy but with a new name – “and this will not do”. Canak's League of Social Democrats of Voivodina is in favour of independence of that Province. And among the citizens of Serbia there is a rising inclination towards a split between the two republics – but it is still far from being predominant. A December investigation of the Centre for Politicological Research of the Institute of Social Sciences in Belgrade shows that the number of those who advocate maintenance of the present relations between the two republics was reduced by half in the course of the year, as well as that the number of supporters of full independence has increased from eight per cent in December 1999 to 21 per cent in December 2000. In just one month – from November to December last year – this number has increased by six per cent. Nevertheless, when those in favour of maximalistic solutions, those in favour of the present state and the ones in favour of minimalistic (confederate) solution are summed up – it is evident that two thirds of the citizens of Serbia still prefer maintenance of some form of a union with Montenegro. It is essential, however, that there is not even a least inclination to obstruct Montenegro in carrying out its plans.

“Not even the best and the optimum constitutional concept will be implemented if two key conditions are not met: good political will and the spirit of the rule of law”, wrote Kostunica at the end of his proposal. Perhaps Serbia and Montenegro could agree on this stand.

Roksanda Nincic

(AIM)