The Local Election Race

AIM Zagreb, May 5, 2001

On the eve of local elections that will be held in Croatia on May 20, there is a growing number of public opinion polls aimed at determining the mood of the voters and the rating of political parties which are running for the first time since the change of government at the beginning of last year. The polls do not indicate any major surprises or perturbations on the political scene. Most view Racan's Social Democrats as the leading party, and the only uncertainty is the position of Budisa's Liberals and Tomcic's Croatian Peasant Party, because they are both hovering around second and third place.

Their successful rivals are the Croatian People's Party of Vesna Pusic and the Democratic Center of Mate Granic, the latter being the only new party to emerge after the latest parliamentary elections in January

1. The fate of the Croatian Democratic Union is still uncertain: some predict its rating will continue to drop, threatening to push it out of parliament, but others say it has fair chances of recovery, due to serious social and economic crises that have not subsided even a year and a half after the change of government.

Be it as it may, the Croatian Democratic Union will certainly be the biggest loser in the upcoming vote, simply because such an outcome it virtually assured by everything that has happened since the 1997 elections. Then, the party won a landslide victory, winning over 70 seats at the local level which is more than it garnered in the parliamentary elections a year earlier. More precisely, the Union took power in 16 of the 21 counties, and in three-fourths of about 400 municipalities. It fared slightly worse in cities where the opposition held the ground firmly from the very start, but even there the Tudjman party had a slight advantage. This time around, however, the results are expected to be quite the reverse.

In themselves, the results of the latest local elections are a great story of the times. They show that the political mood in Croatia is variable, but also that its pendulum frequently strikes back with great force. Namely, the party that wins power at the highest level is very likely to crush its opponents at the local level as well. This, however, has proven to cut both ways, because such results create a threatening void in society's political tissue, which acts with a vengeance against those who triumph. Since this oscillation totally confuses the opposition, in between two election cycles it can no longer articulate even its own political positions, not to mention those of the wider public.

Because of that the voters take this task upon themselves, replacing those whom they had voted into office in previous elections, and the game never ends. This is why it would be very healthy if an upset did happen in these elections, regardless of what the polls say, if nothing else then at least in the ranking, although the best solution would be to see some new, non-partisan names as the winners. And indeed so: there is a host of independent tickets. Osijek has seven such tickets, Velika Gorica and Zadar have six, and Zagreb and Sibenik five.

In a number of early local elections held over the past year and a half, independent tickets were quite successful, particularly in Petrinja and Obrovac. There, dissidents from the former authorities and the current government alike, imposed themselves as politicians who know what "power is all about," but are also aware of its weaknesses and how to correct them, which is a combination always highly appreciated in the part of the world. But this is not to say that a triumph of independent tickets should be expected. Many of them are a typical expression of folk anti-politics, which is a natural companion of crisis situations. This is why such tickets mostly include has-been entertainment stars and athletes, failed politicians, exotic nobodies who surfaced from nowhere for the occasion, et al.

All of them have been attracted mostly by the fact that in Croatia, which has never experienced such a horrible state of affairs, politics is the sole business that still pays off. The local press has been using for some time now the expression "political entrepreneurs," to refer to a class of well-off civil servants who, if they fail in making it to the top, can always get the lesser position of executor or errand-boy, which also bring in regular income. The several hundred German marks they will get will be all they need because elsewhere there is nothing for them, not even a poor and irregularly paid job.

Politicians at the top are all too well aware of that, and this is why their competitors do not upset them nor prompt them to embark on a serious campaign. They launched only a few flat and stupid election slogans ("Let us live like all normal people," "To hit the bull's-eye," "For a Beardless Croatia," etc). No one has mentioned any of the issues normally expected in local elections: the environment, infrastructure improvement... What is even worse, the leading political parties said in advance that something like that should not be expected of them at all.

As they say themselves, elections are for them an opportunity to size up their strength and determine their current political rating, which should serve as a basis for reshuffling the cabinet. Racan announced this by saying it was due to estimates that smaller parties are more critical of the cabinet than promoters of its official policy, thereby obstructing its operation. That there is something wrong with this assessment became obvious last week when the cabinet for the first time failed to hold its regular session allegedly because the necessary paperwork was not completed due to May Day.

It is obvious that the six-member ruling coalition -- meaning all coalition parties and not only the small ones -- are so strongly focused on themselves ahead of the elections that affairs of state are completely sidelined. Even when they tackle them, it is primarily aimed at scoring election points, as was the case in a dispute involving Environment Minister Bozo Kovacevic and Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandic over a house built in the capital without a construction permit. Kovacevic ordered the house torn down in a bid to present himself as a staunch adherent of the rule of law, but Bandic (successfully) countered him by using arguments promoting social solidarity. And now, dear voter, chose your preference!

To an extent, the elections, but not only them, have set the tone for reactions to a statement by the Hague tribunal's chief prosecutor, Carla del Ponte, who said that Tudjman, were he alive, would end up in The Hague. No one from the top responded to that, and when Racan was forced to speak up after being directly asked to do so in parliament, he did his best to answer very indistinctly. He said that Del Ponte stated that in an interview, and that had she stated that officially she would have gotten the answer she deserves. The underlying threat has probably reached The Hague, but Racan meant it for his voters, which is yet another example of how state officials are failing in their duties.

But in some segments the upcoming elections have speeded up state affairs as well. Craving media promotion, the government has finally dismissed the managers and editors of the Slobodna Dalmacija newspaper, rightly describing its editorial policy as "pro-fascist." The Split-based paper, however, was able to pursue its policy for a full 15 months because the ruling parties could not agree on what to do with the paper it ran and which kept attacking it viciously and slanderously -- this probably being the only such example in the whole of Europe.

Marinko Culic

(AIM)