The Government on Tenterhooks

Aim, Zagreb, June 18, 2001

Recently, a shuddering embarrassment shook up Croatia when it turned out that ten years after becoming independent (including year and a half long idyll with the West), Croatia's diplomacy was still in "short pants". The official Zagreb asked the organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to prepare a special report on the state of human rights in Croatia. This was obviously done in a naive hope that there could no longer be anything controversial in that respect and that it would be good for foreign partners to finally abolish the human rights monitoring of their "friends" in Zagreb.

But, the expectations were only partly met. The OSCE responded to Zagreb's request and prepared a report whose results caught the Croatian side quite unprepared. Namely, the report states that generally speaking the state of human rights in Croatia has improved, but that there is no expected progress regarding the return of Serbian refugees and the situation in the judiciary. This was sufficient for another extension of the mandate of this international organisation, while in addition to a heap of already known problems, the authorities in Zagreb got a "friendly" delivery which was beyond their wildest dreams.

According to data, which are also confirmed by the local Serbian sources, some 85 thousand Serbs have returned to Croatia, which, together with those unregistered returnees amounts to probably several hundred thousand (recently, in the Belgrade weekly "Vreme" Zarko Puhovski mentioned the figure of 120 thousand). However, this sizeable number of returnees meet with great legal insecurity (mostly regarding the restitution of expropriated property) and, lately, war crime indictments.

It is suspected that in most cases these indictments are unfounded, which contributes to the creation of an unfavourable environment, especially in Eastern Slavonia, where the concentration of Serbian population is the greatest.

Central coalition authorities in Zagreb do not care for this, which makes the local Serbian officials suspicious that they are not a positive catalyst, but rather a part of that problem (recently, Milorad Pupovac openly accused Ivica Racan of systematically avoiding contacts with the Serbian representatives). Doubts are intensified by evident unwillingness of the ruling Croatian parties to cooperate with the Serbian parties in the establishment of authorities after the recent local elections. Obviously attempting to hide this, in all regions with the greater share of Serbian population the ruling coalition offered all Croatian and Serbian parties to join a large coalition.

The intention was to hide its cooperation with the Serbian parties (although while it was in power the HDZ did not have any such complexes, but easily formed local coalitions with them) behind all that inter-party chaos. And, it seems that this tactics yielded fruit. According to the latest news from the Vukovar-Srijem District, all Croatian and Serbian parties have supported the great coalition (only HDZ was against). In this way, timid authorities from Zagreb have forestalled the accusations of the Right that they were coalescing with the Serbs. But, as could be seen from the unfortunate episode with the OSCE, this little victory was paid dearly.

Moreover, this only confirms that the ruling coalition, stuck in knee-deep mud of months-long mutual quarrels, is loosing the grip on the situation and that some key problems of the country are bypassing it. This was very evident in the case of the great budget scandal, about which the ruling team was recently forced to inform the public. And while they had their hands full with the division of powers after the local elections, it suddenly became obvious that a much greater problem was troubling the country. It was so much greater that for a moment they had to stop quarrelling and deal with it. The problem was that the state budget was being replenished at a much slower than the required pace so that in the first four months the state treasury got around four billion kunas less than envisaged.

In case the deficit persisted till the end of year, budget inflow would be as much as one quarter below the projected one, threatening to block the state and its agencies. In order to prevent this, the Government was forced to heavily borrow abroad, trying nervously at the same time to reduce budgetary pressures by cutting the salaries of civil servants and announcing its intentions to reduce army and police troop strength. The Government assumed this responsibility before the IMF and it is not necessary to explain that it means choosing between a drastic cut of the public debt and being at the mercy of this international financial corporal.

In such a situation, the Government started issuing statements which sound like "market fundamentalism", because they almost threateningly remind citizens that Croatia has embarked upon "hard capitalism" and that the one time social security is gone forever. But, in first criticism of this hard-line rhetoric a question was raised whether such incapable political elite (which has been dealing with fruitless political scandals for months while the state was losing its shirt) goes together with this capitalism.

Racan's Government stubbornly disregarded that criticism until its internal seams started to come apart and it was no longer possible to hide that the top ranks of authorities were going through an acute leadership crisis. Short time ago, Ivan Jakovcic, leader of the Istrian Democratic Alliance, resigned from the Government irritated by this Alliance's accusations that by amending the Istrian Statutes he has taken a road towards destructive regionalism(which is an accusation from Tudjman's times). Although Jakovcic's departure most probably was not only motivated by these accusations, the fact remains that his colleagues in the Government, frustrated by criticism and their own powerlessness, treated him as some kind of scapegoat and vented their anger accumulated for months on him.

Soon after Jakovcic, Justice Minister Stjepan Ivanisevic also resigned. True, he did it on account of his failing health, but this was certainly accompanied by his dissatisfaction with the state in judiciary, which was literally devastated under Tudjman's rule. All Ivanisevic's efforts to change this fell through, mostly because it was impossible to breathe fresh air into the inherited judiciary, but also because of his coalition colleagues' imputations and unprofessionalism.

Quite indecisive whether to change anything in the Government for quite a long time, Racan is now trying to take advantage of the departure of two Ministers to reshuffle his Cabinet announcing that these posts will be filled not according to the party quotas, but on the basis of professional merits. In all likelihood, this is just another attempt at controlling and eliminating growingly loud protests. For, when at the beginning of his term everyone suggested that he should form an expert Government, he flatly rejected such proposals obviously hoping that he could form a strong Cabinet relying on parties alone.

He has now changed his mind and decided to strengthen his own position in the top ranks, if need be, at the expense of the political parties. In order to eliminate troubles they could create for him, he will try to consolidate his position in the public, which, according to some media, he will address with a kind of "bull" which would call for a consensus on a number of key national issues. Some have already accused him of resorting to Franjo Tudjman's manoeuvring and tricks, which only assured him that he is on the right track.

Marinko Culic

(AIM)