Montenegro Faced with a Decision

Elections - Yes, Referendum - Maybe

Parliamentary parties in Montenegro have finally reached an agreement: early elections are scheduled for April 22. The decision on the long announced referendum will be made only after the elections, although Montenegrin President Djukanovic had said that he would bring up the decision on the referendum before the deputies of the new parliament on their very first working day

AIM Podgorica, January 25, 2001

Early elections will take place on April 22, and the new parliament will decide about the referendum. This is briefly the result of several-month long negotiations of representatives of all parliamentary parties at meetings with the chairman of Montenegrin parliament and his deputies. It was agreed that an extraordinary session of the parliament of Montenegro be held on January 31 where - except for shortening of the mandate of the Assembly - the Law on Referendum would be passed along with the amendments of the Law on the Election of Councilmen and Deputies and the amendments of the Law on Public Information. At the latest meeting of the working group, only the Liberal League of Montenegro (LSCG) opposed this agreement insisting on joint precise scheduling of the elections and the referendum.

But, this is just a technical matter: the essence is that things are significantly accelerating in Montenegro and that soon answers will come in sight to many key questions on the future of individuals, parliamentary parties, but also the future of Montenegro.

It is quite certain - if in the forthcoming elections, the majority of votes will be won by the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS), the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and the Liberal League, the parties that insist on resolving of the state status - the referendum will take place. This thesis is confirmed by the declaration of the President of Montenegro, Djukanovic. "With pleasure and utmost responsibility I will propose on the very first working day of the new parliament, that a decision be made on the referendum about the state status of Montenegro", declared Djukanovic at the recent press conference.

And the other way round: if the Socialist People's Party (SNP), the People's Party (NS) and the Serb People's Party (SNS) prevail - there will be no referendum. This was already announced by Predrag Bulatovic, vice-president of the Socialist People's Party. "When we win the elections, there will be no referendum, and then President Djukanovic will be forced to schedule, new, early presidential elections", Bulatovic announced optimistically.

"This is an open-card poker game in which the cards are known, except for the last one - the trump card", concluded Blagota Mitric, member of the Constitutional Court of Montenegro. It seems that Dr. Mitric is right: the starting positions of all the political protagonists are known, the only thing that is not known is - who the winner will be.

At this moment, based on a public opinion poll, it seems that chances are small that a single party can be the absolute winner of the forthcoming elections. The poll made by CEDEM (Centre of Human Rights and Democracy) shows that the Democratic Party of Socialists is still the most powerful party in Montenegro (30.7 per cent of the subjects place their confidence in it), next to it is the Socialist People's Party (24.6 per cent), then follow the Liberal League (9.1 per cent), the People's Party (7 per cent), the Social Democratic Party (4.5 per cent)...

Such relation of forces indicates that establishment of pre-election alliances should be expected. Splits will occur concerning the main issue - the state status. This has also been for quite some time the main line of political division in Montenegro and that is the reason why many analysts, with good reason, stress that the early elections will in fact be a "mini referendum".

It is no big secret, Montenegrin parliamentary parties are already divided in two blocks: DPS, SDP and LSCG are in favour of internationally recognised Montenegro and SNP, NS and SNS are in favour of Yugoslavia without international recognition of the members of this federal union.

Judging by the mentioned poll, united forces of the Democratic Party of Socialists, the Liberal League and the Social Democratic Party might win quite a decisive victory in the elections - polls speak of 46 per cent of the votes in favour of this coalition. On the other hand, the "Yugoslav block" that would be formed by SNP, NS and SNS would win the support of about 33 per cent of the voters.

At first sight it seems very simple. But as it has already become a tradition in the Balkans - nothing will be either simple or predictable. According to the statements made so far, formation of the coalition of parties whose common goal is preservation of FR Yugoslavia is more likely. The Socialist People's Party and the two parties of the Populists (the People's Party and the Socialist People's Party) are already appearing almost jointly. They demanded early elections together and this demand was met, they threatened they would boycott the referendum, and the date was postponed. The logistic support offered by the European Union to the authorities in Belgrade is the additional motivation factor for this "pro-Yugoslav block" to be extremely unyielding in negotiations.

Besides, all the three parties have regular and very intensive contacts with official Belgrade, in the first place with President of FRY Kostunica (representatives of SNP and SNS are in the federal government). And the leaders of the People's Party were recently the "guests" of the President of FRY - on the same day when he talked with Djukanovic in Belgrade. According to the sources from the top of the party, Kostunica suggested the leaders of the People's Party to enter a union with the Socialist People's Party in order to defeat the coalition (or the parties) which prefer internationally recognised Montenegro in early elections.

Although it is not easy for the People's Party to make such a decision

• after all the bitter words they have uttered about the leaders of the SNP in the past three years - it seems that they are getting closer to forming a pre-election alliance. They are pushed towards such pre-election calculus by the danger that their present rating of seven per cent might melt during the campaign. Similar happened to the Liberal League in 1998 elections: from a rating of 13 per cent during the vehement campaign it dropped down to just 6.3 per cent because their votes were "sucked in" by the coalition "For Better Living".

The same thing might happen to the People's Party: that a part of its present supporters at the decisive moment, in the elections, decide to give their votes to the stronger – the Socialist People's Party, calculating that the vote given to that party would more strongly contribute to the struggle against the “secessionists from the DPS”. Experience has shown that minor parties are “devoured” in the struggle between two domineering blocks. All this considered, the coalition of the People's Party with the Socialist People's Party does not seem any more as a highly improbable future.

It is more difficult to estimate whether the DPS, the SDP and the LSCG will form a pre-election alliance. The position of Rakcevic's Social Democrats is the most predictable: they will enter the union with Djukanovic's DPS, because it will ensure them a continuation of rule (being on the verge of the necessary limit to be represented in the parliament) and it increases their chances to achieve the platform objective – independent Montenegro.

The Liberal League, the strongest and the most consistent advocate of independent Montenegro, however, has been at political war with the DPS and the SDP for a long time. Although they have been in a coalition with these two parties on the local level since 1998 elections, in the past two years the Liberals have become severe critics of the Coalition and they even terminated the cooperation on the municipal level last year, which resulted in local elections in Podgorica and Herceg Novi. After that, the distance between their positions continued to increase.

But, observed only on the basis of political declarations, it does not seem that there is such a big gap between the LSCG on the one and the DPS and the SDP on the other hand. After the People's Party had stepped out of the coalition with the latter two, the Liberals offered support to the minority government until the referendum.

It will never be clarified whether the DPS does not want to establish an alliance with the Liberals or whether the pressure of the international community required scheduling of the elections.

Indeed, Djukanovic's DPS is the greatest puzzle. In the course of all the past years this party liked to play the role of the party of the centre: in mid nineties it collected political points by taking the position between the extreme Montenegrin and the extreme Serb parties. It is trying to do something similar now: it is at the same time in favour of internationally recognised Montenegro, and of the alliance with Serbia. This was supposed to be the winning tactics again. But the stand of official Belgrade and rejection of the platform of Montenegrin government simply forced the DPS to make up its mind – it cannot remain a party of the centre any more. The main Djukanovic's problem is now whether his party membership is mature enough to accept the decision on independent Montenegro. Certain developments within the party indicate that it might cause certain disturbances inside the party and this probably causes concern among the leaders of DPS – they do not need internal clashes before the elections.

It is therefore more probable that Djukanovic and his party comrades will choose a middle solution again: they will not enter a big pre-election coalition with the Liberal League but will maintain cooperation with the SDP. In this way, they like to believe in the DPS, they will keep the inclination of the undecided voters who find the Liberals repulsive, and at the same time they would attract, thanks to the presence of the SDP, a part of those who without reservation support sovereign Montenegro. In that case, the alliance with the Liberal League would be made only for the referendum.

But that could make a very uncertain election race. Polls show that the coalition of the DPS and the SDP has the support of 34.2 per cent of the citizens, while the opposite block – the SNP, the NS and the SNS – is preferred by 33.1 per cent. The one that wins gets the right to form the government, which means that nuances will decide.

Early elections on April 22 might therefore be the most unpredictable so far, less predictable even than the presidential ones when Djukanovic beat Bulatovic “by a whisker” (five thousand votes).

The stakes are higher now: it will depend on the outcome of the elections not only who will rule Montenegro, but also – what Montenegro will be like: independent or a member of the federation, and this certainly is not a small difference.

Drasko DJURANOVIC

(AIM)