KOSOVO BEFORE THE ELECTIONS

The Albanians will not vote again. The Serbs living in Kosovo will choose mostly between Milossevicc's Socialists and Arkan's Party of Serbian Unity. The main trump-card of the Socialists is their President, whose reputation among the Serbs in Kosovo is still high. Arkan is investing enormous amounts of money, a rumour goes that he donated 30 thousand marks to a village whose inhabitants promised that they would give ttheir votes to him. The other parties are playng the roles of outsiders, includiong Ssesselj's Radicals.

AIM, Prisstina, dec. 17. Two things were quite clear from the very beginning of the election campaign in Kosovo: that the Albanians will boycott the elections again, and that the Serbs will be choosing between the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) and Arkan's Party of Serbian Unity (SSJ).

The SPS based its entire election marketing on the halo of their President, Slobodan Milossevicc, who still enjoys remarkable prestige among the Serbs in Kosovo. The SPS propagandists are probably aware that they have no accomplishments of the party in power to show to the Serbs instead. "It is from Kosovo that Milossevicc set out to create the new Serbian state", the President of the Kosovo Socialists, Vojislav Zzivkovicc, stressed on several occasions at pre-election gatherings of his party. "It was in Kosovo that Milossevicc started the struggle for state and national unity of the Serbian people and lay the foundations of its resistance to the new world order", the Director of Radio-Television Serbia and one of the SPS candidates, Milorad Vuchelicc, said to the supporters of the Socialists in Pecc. "Led by Milossevicc who is fighting like a lion against all those who do not mean us well, we can get over the present difficult situation", another SPS candidate, the well-known actor, Velimir Bata Zzivojinovicc emphasized in his pre-election speech. Taking cover behind the authority of their President, is an overall characteristic of the Socialists' election campaign in Serbia in general; but in Kosovo it combines with anti-Albanian rhetoric in Kosovo. Vojislav Zzivkovicc spoke of "vandalism and indulgence of Albanian separatists" which was "stopped by the SPS with Milossevicc at its head". Milorad Vuchelicc used the term "interruption of a genocide". That is why the call addressed by the leader of "Young Socialists", Dussanka Djogo, to the Albanians to vote for the SPS "because this party alone can gurantee that the Albanians and the Serbs will live on equal terms with the others", acquired a specially cynical note in Kosovo.

According to the coverage in the media and the money invested, Kosovo election campaign was dominated by Zzeljko Razznjatovicc Arkan. The outstanding attention of the Serbs, however, was not drawn so much by the posters, photographs, paid advertisments in the local daily "Jedinstvo", Radio and TV Prisstina commercials, as by Arkan's political concerts - caravans all round Kosovo, accompanied by about ten "Mitsubishi" jeeps equipped with police signalization and radio-connections. According to the unofficial reports, Arkan also invested enormous quantities of food in his election campaign. In Dechani, he asked Serbian immigrants from Albania to give him the list of clothing and shoes they needed "because he cannot bear looking at them needy as they are". A story goes that in Laplje selo, he gave 30 thousand German marks for installation of telephone lines in the village, under the condition that all the inhabitants vote for him. Arkan's rhetoric swarmed with promises. "We are here to watch carefully and secure that not a single Serb will ever get hurt" he said at the concert in Kosovska Mitrovica. At all the gatherings Arkan stressed that "each step of this sacred Serbian country will be soaked with blood of those who dare attack the Serbian people in this space", promising that he would be "the first at the head of his Tigers to defend his people". Arkan gave the biggest promise ever, with the exception of the promise given by the SPS concerning the lifting of the sanctions - which was not addressed at all the citizens. While addressing his supporters in Grachanica, he said that his Party, should it come to power, would colonize Kosovo with 500 thousand Serbs, and he promised to the natives that he would make them rich. It is interesting that occasionally sparks flew between the SPS and Arkan's Party. At the very beginning of the campaign, the President of the Socialists of Prishtina, Zoran Gligorijevicc, stated that "the SPS looks upon Arkan as its political opponent and that his candidates who are not from Kosovo cannot represent the interests of Kosovo." The President of the SPS of Kosovo, V. Zzivkovicc, also said at a gathering in Oblicc, that the rumours about the Party of Serbian Unity being "on our side" were not true.

In comparison with the SPS and the SSJ, the other Serbian parties appeared somewhat irresolute, organizing gatherings mostly in Prishtina. It turned out that the tart comment of one of the SPS candidates that "many leaders of the Serbian opposition needed guides for their cruising around Kosovo these days" was not far from the truth. One of the new political ideas which were offered is the idea of the Democratic Party of Serbia to split Kosovo into regions - Rashka, Vranje and Metohija - with only the latter having its seat in Kosovo - in Prizren. The Democratic Party promised that, if it wins, it would establish a separate bank for development of Kosovo. The Albanians were addressed most directly and most constructively by the Associated Leftists. At the place where Boro and Ramiz (the symbol of brotherhood and unity once) were buried, the President of the League of Communists -Movement for Yugoslavia, Dragomir Drashkovicc, offered the Albanians a model of an equal life with the Serbian citizens in Serbia. Judging by the scope of the engagement of DEPOS in Kosovo, its leaders obviously assessed that they cannot achieve much in the competition with the Socialists and the followers of Arkan. Only a day before the pre-election silence, the DEPOS had its major promotion rally in Prishtina. Ssesselj's Radicals in Kosovo, reducing their campaign to a few press conferences and not budging from Prishtina, were the least convincing of them all. On the day before last of the campaign, they were refused hospitality in the biggest "GRAND" Hotel in Prishtina where meetings with the journalists were regularly held. The President of the Radicals in Kosovo, Ranko Babicc, claimed that the ban of of the Radicals from the "GRAND" (where Arkan's headquarters were), was the result of "Ssesselj's having justly attacked the activities of the President of Party of Serbian Unity".

ISMET HAJDARI