Djukanovic Nominates Candidate for Prime Minister

Minority Government for Minor Deeds

The very announcement that the new prime minister will be – the old one, Filip Vujanovic, speaks in favour of the hypothesis that Montenegrin leadership fears that the minority government will not last long, least of all that it will initiate serious reforms. This, however, does not mean that there will not be many personnel re-shuffling, primarily within the Democratic Party of Socialists

AIM Podgorica, May 31, 2001

“I believed it was best if the government would be headed by a man who is capable of immediately shouldering responsibility for carrying out strategic tasks and achieving goals which at this time await the Government of the Republic. At the post of the prime minister, Mr. Vujanovic has manifested high professionalism, political competence, sincere commitment to reforms”. With these words Montenegrin President Milo Djukanovic explained his own decision to bestow the right to establish the new Montenegrin cabinet on Filip Vujanovic, Vice-President of Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS).

At its session scheduled for June 5, Montenegrin parliament should officially entrust Vujanovic to do this job and to vote the new government. This would be the end of the forty-day long post-election political drama which seemed to have no way out. For a year – it is written in the agreement signed by the leaders of “Victory of Montenegro” coalition and Liberal League of Montenegro (LSCG) – the Liberals will support the minority government of DPS and Social Democratic Party (SDP) and all legal moves and proposals directed towards organisation of the referendum on state status. In return, Djukanovic's and Rakcevic's coalition will support the election of Vesna Perovic, spokeswoman of LSCG for the chairman of Montenegrin parliament.

This means that for the first time in eleven years of the multiparty system, a minority government will rule Montenegro, and for the first time the parliament will not be chaired by an official of the Democratic Party of Socialists (in the past six years Svetozar Marovic, Vice-President of DPS, was at this post).

In other circumstances this might have been qualified as a democratic breakthrough, as loss of monopoly held by the Democratic Party of Socialists during the past decade. Perhaps the publicly expressed intention to schedule the referendum could have been interpreted as the beginning of resolving the question of the state status of Montenegro.

This is, however, just an illusion: neither is the minority government a democratic breakthrough, nor is resolving of the problem of state status of Montenegro in sight. One could rather say that this is a – forced solution. After the failure of the tragicomic negotiations with “Together for Yugoslavia” coalition, after they had “succeeded” in discrediting their policy in public, the leaders of the Liberal League had no choice – they could do nothing else but support the minority government of SDP and DPS. Any other solution would have been crushing for the leaders of LSCG and it is not very likely that they would have politically survived any such shift. Even as it is – because of the negotiations with the other political option behind the scene – they will have to face sharp criticism of their own membership.

On the other hand, after the Liberals had publicly declared that they would support minority government, the ruling coalition of DPS and SDP could not hesitate for long: in order to preserve power and complete the project of state independence they had to accept the proposal of the Liberal League.

But it is difficult to conceal the political truth: the option of Montenegrin independence is severely shaken. The three parties which speak of Montenegrin sovereignty have shown in practice that they had not been sufficiently politically wise to unite in the work on the joint project. Indeed what ones say about the others shows that there is terrible animosity among them: neither do the Liberals trust Djukanovic and Rakcevic that they are truly devoted to independence of Montenegro, nor do Djukanovic and Rakcevic consider Slavko Perovic and his party colleagues from LSCG their sincere allies in the political struggle against Bulatovic, Soc and Bojovic, leaders of “Together for Yugoslavia” coalition.

To put it differently: the parties of the so-called Montenegrin block resemble more political opponents than allies who are working together on reforms and reconstruction of Montenegrin state. That is what brought about the political paradox: that the three parties which have the majority of votes in Montenegrin parliament (about 52 per cent of the seats) are forming a minority government!

And to make things even more interesting, the minority government headed by Filip Vujanovic is expected to re-establish the shaken confidence in state institutions, to begin talks within Montenegro and with Serbia, to ensure consensus about the referendum... And moreover, to create conditions for normal operation of Montenegrin economy in order to prevent the growing social discontent culminating in workers' protests. In other words, the new minority government of Filip Vujanovic has the task to achieve what no Montenegrin government has managed to do in the past ten years!

Therefore, despite optimistic announcements from the ranks of the Democratic Party of Socialists and the Social Democratic Party, despite the agreement on cooperation they signed with the Liberal League of Montenegro, formation of the minority government seems to be – buying time.

It seems that Djukanovic himself was well aware of that. His entrusting Vujanovic with the post of the prime minister was an indirect sign that there would be no revolutionary changes. Vujanovic has never been known as a man of great political changes or daring undertakings in the economy.

According to the information AIM has, the new government will not resemble the previous ones, though: leaders of DPS and SDP have agreed to try to bring into the government independent persons who do not belong to any party – up to 30 per cent of the members of the government. In this way, Zarko Rakcevic, President of SDP believes, confidence in state institutions would be re-established, political movement would be strengthened as well as the position in relation to the international comunity.

But the idea of the participation of persons who do not belong to any political party in the government has seriously been undermined by the acting of the Liberal League. Just a day after it had made it public that it would support the minority government, this party directed its criticism towards – Djukanovic's and Rakcevic's coalition. Accusing primarily Djukanovic of “the most terrible form of police and secret-police pressure on LSCG, the leaders of this party clearly showed that it was in fact very difficult to predict the future of the political agreement between LSCG and “Victory of Montenegro” coalition. In other words: this will discourage many independent persons from undertaking the serious state job from which, by will of the Liberal League, they could be sacked at any moment, without their fault.

For everything said, it is more probable to expect that the minority government will maintain the existing status quo, without any true will for and possibility of making radical turns. At the same time leaders of DPS will initiate negotiations within Montenegro, but also with Belgrade in order to try to take the initiative and re-establish shaken self-confidence after having lost absolute power. It is, therefore, logical to assume that the question of the referendum could be postponed and that, before the referendum, there may even be new elections. Some kind of a second chance for Djukanovic and Rakcevic.

Drasko DJURANOVIC

(AIM)