CORRUPTION - A WAY OF LIFE
Serbia:Aleksandar Ciric (AIM Beograd)
The problem of corruption in Serbia does not come down to Milosevic and his clients, but the ease with which the relation between the authorities and the citizens has become corrupted. Here's an example: at the peak of hyper-inflation in 1993/94 in Belgrade a "holder of tenant's right" could purchase a "social" three-bedroom apartment of 80 square meters for some DM 130. Since most people are not thick-headed, they knew that DM 130 could not be the real value of an apartment - which meant that hundreds of thousands of people became owners "thanks to Milosevic" even though they probably feared (maybe unconsciously) the possibility of someone coming after him who would say: "Hey people, you cannot do that!"
But they did. A common man had to "charm" a shop-assistant so that she would leave him two to three litres of milk (oil, sugar, coffee, etc.) at the time when it was in short supply, to pay certain professors "preparatory lessons" so that his child could enter a secondary school or university studies of his choice, to get informed of the price-list for exams at the selected faculty, the amount of "sponsor donation" he would have to pay for specific medical services and the value of expected "present" in case the surgery was successful, etc. At somewhat higher level, a street huckster of all kinds of things had to grease palms so as to get a street counter, even when it was no more than a cardboard box, to give boxes of cigarettes, bottles of alcohol, tights or whatever he was trading in so as to buy off and secure understanding of market inspectors, market-place officials or police patrols.
Certain bigger entrepreneurs - higher-ranking resellers - paid someone else higher-up to allow them regular supply of cigarettes, gasoline, coffee - the most profitable trading articles. Bosses of these businesses held official position in one of the state institutions and operated on the market divided according to the services they did to the regime and its architect - Slobodan Milosevic and his wife. It thus happened that, basically, Zeljko Raznatovic Arkan (who introduced himself as either a Belgrade pastry-shop owner or MUP official), Mirko Marjanovic (who was allowed, as Milosevic's Prime Minister, to trade in state wheat reserves for his own and for his boss' account), Mihalj Kertes ("Minister for People" and Director of the Federal Customs Service - who allowed his custom officers to take from every passenger as much as they wanted) and Marko Milosevic (the son who, as his father publicly claimed, earned money with his own two hands and thanks to his abilities) were all in the same business.
As of 1991, the regular police force included an increasing number of criminals or suspicious types. Its efficiency proportionately increased until nobody's life was safe any longer. A crime punishable by three to five years in prison could be "redeemed" for some DM 15 thousand. Members of investigative authorities, judiciary and the bar were equally involved in these transactions. Higher-level "economic-political" structures were held accountable only if their protégés became over-ambitious in their "business" (approved by them) or if the prospective favourites with the authorities were known to be skilful at "court" intrigues.
It thus happened that FR Yugoslavia ranked second, right behind Nigeria, on the "Transparency International" (TI) index for the year 2000 regarding the extent of corruption. For some reason Yugoslavia is not on this year's corruption index, but in the meantime first serious contacts have been established between the Yugoslav researchers and TI. In the past and this year, the Belgrade Centre for Study of Alternatives (CPA) organised three studies that correspond to the standards of Transparency International.
The published results show that since the change of the regime last October there have been some changes so that FRY is no longer the leading country in the Balkans in respect of corruption, but that Albania and Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H) have taken the lead in this shameful race. A representative sample of Serbian citizens thinks that the main causes of corruption are low incomes, greedy authorities, "transitional moral crisis" of the society, bad laws, combination of private and public interests, inefficiency of the judicial system and lack of control; the list ends with the "communist heritage" and national traits.
Corruption as the key social problem citizens of Serbia place fifth on the list (after political instability, crime, poverty and low incomes), while Montenegrins put it as six (after political instability, unemployment, low incomes, poverty and crime). Similar surveys carried out in other Balkan countries show that corruption is the greatest social problem in Albania and Romania, second on the list in B&H and Croatia, third in Macedonia and fourth in Bulgaria. Poverty, unemployment and low wages are always mentioned as accompanying problems, which can be discouraging in view of the predominant experiences of societies in transition.
As far as Yugoslavia is concerned, citizens of Serbia think that corruption is widest-spread among customs officers, policemen, businessmen, judges, tax collectors, doctors, local officials and political leaders. They consider the representatives of non-governmental organisations, teachers and journalists to be the least corrupted.
Six months after the establishment of a special Anti-Corruption Commission of the Government of Serbia there are no signs that the authorities have seriously come to grips with the corruption or its consequences. The Serbian Vice-Premier in charge of this problem, Vuk Obradovic, was relieved of this duty (because of "sexual harassment" of his female party colleagues and Government employees) after his first public reports on the Commission's findings. The scandal broke after former employees of the BK TV station (owned by Bogoljub Karic - a businessman who during Milosevic's rule over Serbia and FR Yugoslavia accumulated enormous wealth and, along the way, paid racket to the regime, but also financed some opposition parties in Serbia) gave statements to that effect.
Milan Panic (once Milosevic's Federal Prime Minister and then his opponent at the Serbian presidential elections), owner of ICN-Galenika also got caught in this odd-even game: DOS (some coalition members especially) thinks that his ownership of the largest drugs factory in the Balkans is dubious (which will be probably resolved by the international arbitration). After some (unexplained) delay, the Assembly of Serbia adopted the Law on Single Taxation of Extra Profits and property earned by the use of special benefits, i.e. close links with Milosevic's authorities.
In the meantime, Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic on two occasions (first time on the occasion of the first 100 days of the Government of Serbia) pointed out that this Government was unique because it was not involved in any financial scandals. Last week Mladjan Dinkic, a member of the Government Anti-Corruption Commission, Governor of the National Bank, published a list of 248 firms that since the beginning of the 90's had access to the grey money issue: Bogoljub Karic ranked second on the list of extra profit tax payers with a tax base of some DM 140 million. The total tax base just for that list of debtors was over DM eight billion and, if all deadlines laid down by the Law on Extra Profit and Property are observed, it could bring to the Serbian budget as much money as Serbia was promised at the recent Donors Conference in five times shorter period. Or, according to more modest estimates of economic experts from G 17+, DM one billion by the beginning of the fall.
Doubts regarding the firm resolve of the new authorities are only additionally stirring up mutual corruption accusations exchanged between DOS members. Even if this is a new assignment of roles within the ruling coalition, the cause of serious concern is certainly the fact that two laws have been withdrawn after the enactment of the Law on Taxation of Extra Profit: the Recommendation on the Code of Conduct for Public Officials (which should regulate some basic rules of modesty - from clothes to the use of "motor pool") and the Resolution on the Anti-Corruption Fight (a kind of "letter of intent" which clearly states the intention of the highest authorities of Serbia to fight the corruption). The explanation was that the problem of corruption should be resolved by a set of laws and regulations, i.e. that the problem was too complex.