FRY: Census 2001

And How Many of Us Were There After All?

In all likelihood, the pending population census in Yugoslavia will be just another in a series of failed attempts at registering the number of inhabitants made in the last (20th) century.

AIM Belgrade, February 5, 2001

This might be a slightly excessive reaction to a two-week campaign of the Federal (SZS) and Republican Statistical Offices (RZS) of Serbia and Montenegro to be carried out from April 1 to 15. Even those who do not agree that 13 years Milosevic's rule have, among other things, ruined the profession of statisticians, do not deny that the pending census will be more complex than any previous one.

The first Yugoslavia had two population censuses: in 1921 and again in

1. The first post-war census was conducted in 1948 in a hurry and without sufficient preparations so that it had to be "repeated" in 1953. Two decades later, for the old and new national historians, ethno-geneticists and proponents of a better future on the foundations of historic ordeals, no census was good enough, no result precise enough and no data processing reliable enough.

The internal - much more than "national" - policy of the second Yugoslavia greatly contributed to this. At the 1971 census a "new" nation appeared - the Moslems. Immediately after that came another one, statistically separately registered - the Yugoslavs. At the 1981 census the latter registered the maximum figure(1.219 million in contrast to 274 thousand registered in 1971), for as many as 714 thousand people declared themselves as Yugoslavs just before the disintegration of SFRY in 1991.

Naturally, the problem is not of the statistical character: they only serve to register the facts. Their interpretation of 1971 census became the subject of a dispute which hardly has anything to do with the profession. Already in 1981 the Albanian population of Kosovo and Metohija boycotted the census partially, and in 1991 completely. However, this is not the only blank area. The statistical data processing - apart from Kosovo, the census was never completed in at least two communes of Bosnia and Herzegovina: Bugojno and Kupres - stopped at the communal level; before SZS started the synthetic data processing Yugoslavia disintegrated. After that, everyone was free to (ab)use and interpret "their" data as it suited their purposes. The history of Yugoslav wars (1991-1999) shows that this opportunity was used greatly in claims to certain percentages of the Yugoslav territory, as well as in flying the war flags and saber-rattling.

Srdjan Bogosavljevic, former Director of the SZS, now the first man of the "Strategic Marketing", Belgrade agency for public opinion surveys which in the past several years has earned the reputation of the most reliable agency of this kind, thinks that the next census will be a priori deficient for two reasons. Technically speaking the profession has been ruined in the past ten years. People have been leaving the Statistical Office in waves ever since 1990, so that after 1996 the only left statisticians were those who, in Srdjan Bogosavljevic's words, adjusted the results of surveys and their statistical publications to Milosevic's statements.

Much greater problem is that the population census will not be carried out on the territories of all ex-Yugoslav Republics at the same time and according to the same methodology. Bosnia and Herzegovina has already abandoned the idea of conducting the census this year and has decided to postpone it for some better times. It was impossible to establish contact with the Croatian statistical services so soon after the democratic changes in FR Yugoslavia, so that no agreement on methodology could be reached. "This census might provide the picture of the effects of all recent wars, on condition that it is carried out in all former Yugoslav Republics and according to the same census questionnaire", thinks Bogosavljevic. "Only simultaneous census can give the picture of ethnic cleansing, or else the room for manipulations will be enormous: if Croatia registers its refugees in one way and we in another, everyone will have his own interpretation of what has happened in the meantime".

Even on the internal plane, the census of refugees - whether on the basis of one-year residence or citizenship granted in the meantime - will not give the true picture of the situation since, at least as far as Croatia (and as of recent, FR Yugoslavia too) is concerned issuing of passports to refugees is carried out on the basis of bilateral agreement on dual citizenship. This can mean, and not only theoretically, that both states will register citizens with dual citizenship - and in the census to be carried out in Bosnia and Herzegovina also, but in a year or two.

Serbia has a problem with the "displaced persons", i.e. non-Albanian population exiled from Kosovo and Metohija, which again will not be covered by the census. Provisions of the Law on Census from 1999, which envisage the conducting of census in Kosovo and Metohija after the expiry of UMNIK mandate, sound like science-fiction. But, even without such details and deadlines, which no one dares specify, this is not the end of the list of predictable "deficits" and, in the spirit of census tradition from the beginning of this story, "surpluses" of problems to be discussed.

Final preparations for the census are being carried out in an atmosphere of a smoldering conflict between the two federal units - Serbia and Montenegro. In this context, the census might appear as an argument in inflamed emotions regarding the announced, scheduled, promised and expected Montenegrin referendum on sovereignty. Naturally, a sober remark that population census has nothing to do with these discussion is not of much help here.

Statistically speaking, the census should determine the size of the Montenegrin population of age, i.e. those who will declare their opinion at the mentioned referendum. Politically speaking, the problem is naturally much more complex. The available data show that Montenegro has 440 thousand citizens with voting right. Another 30 thousand FRY citizens have valid papers showing that they are residents of Montenegro: those are the citizens who in the past several years took advantage of the possibility to buy car there cheap, which they couldn't do in Milosevic's Serbia. However, there are another 130 thousand Montenegrins in Serbia and, according to estimates, some 300 thousand people of Montenegrin origin. Question is whether they - as well as Montenegrins abroad - will get the right to vote at the referendum.

Advocates of the Montenegrin independence say NO and support the idea of President Milo Djukanovic on this. De facto, and not de jure, citizens of Montenegro will have their say at this referendum. According to well informed statistical experts, the problem with such categorical stand is that in practice it could mean that the national minorities (Montenegrin Albanians and Moslems) will be the ones to decide the independence of Montenegro. Results of a recently conducted (still unpublished) Montenegrin public opinion survey show that 29 percent of orthodox population is in favour of the independent Montenegro, while 40 percent is against its separation from FR Yugoslavia.

The others are in favour of a loose federation or confederation, but – note the survey-takers - as a solution which would not change anything in the present links between the two Republics. This points to the conclusion that the more or less separatist-oriented minorities might be the ones to decide for Montenegrins.

The Montenegrin Moslems are mostly voters of political parties without national attributes. However, in Serbia they are rallied around two national parties. One of them is Rasim Ljajic's Party of Democratic Action which as a DOS (Democratic Opposition of Serbia) member has its representatives in the federal and republican Government. Recently, Rasim Ljajic as Federal Minister for Minority Issues, has threatened to leave the Government in case the Moslems are denied a right to declare themselves - and be registered - as Bosniacs at the pending census.

It would not be appropriate to maliciously ask here what was the sense and purpose of introducing Moslems into the 1971 census, primarily because they no longer exist as a nation in Bosnia and Herzegovina either. However, Constitutions of FRY, Serbia and Montenegro still mention the Moslems as one of the constitutive nations. And, in case they massively declare themselves as Bosniacs at the next census, that could cause problems with the constitutional definition and their political status. As Bosniacs, with their own mother country - Bosnia and Herzegovina - the until yesterday's Yugoslav Moslems would become a national minority. Or, which is also a possibility, Sanjak would be invisibly divided into the Montenegrin (the "Moslem") and the Yugoslav (the "Bosniac") part.

Come what may, the majority of statistical experts agree that the pending census will not even provide the exact basic figure - how many inhabitants does FR Yugoslavia have. Kosovo and Metohija will remain a two-million people "heavy" blank area. The "margin" of refugees/unregistered citizens - or those who will be registered two or three times in two to three states - may reach some 300 thousand people. The data on FRY citizens who "temporarily" live permanently abroad - and not only since 1991 – will remain incomplete not only because their mother country is registering them for the first time, but also because half of FRY diplomatic representation offices abroad will not be able to conduct the population census.

For all the above mentioned reasons it would not be a joke to say that perhaps only the 2011 census might prove correct. This is how one of the Directors of the republican Statistical Office of Serbia has put it: "If anyone could guarantee that conditions for census in December would be good, I would postpone this one immediately".

Aleksandar Ciric

(AIM)