NO ADDMITANCE TO THE EDITORIAL OFFICES

AIM, SPLIT, February 3, 1994. " I was not permitted to enter the editorial offices of "Slobodna Dalmacija." When a statement like this is made by one of the former employees or one of those sent on forced leave, his collocutor is bound to lift an eyebrow in disbelief with a quizzing look that suggests the question - why? Obviously, although people find it very hard to believe that someone is making lists of those who are subject to such prohibitions,in the course of last ten months, such a practice has unfortunately been rather common in the editorial offices of the Split newspaper.

What can be said of the notice signed by the head of the security and administrative affairs service, Ljubo Kovac, and put up on the main entrance of the news agency "Slobodna Dalmacija - Novine d.d.", prohibiting entrance into the building to those individuals who are still on the payrole of this organization ? The doormen have been given orders not to allow some twenty employees to enter, because, according to the explaination from the notice," the Legal Affairs Department brought a decision on November 23, 1993 banning the entrance into the premises of the enterprise to the employees who have been sent on forced leave." The document contains a list of twenty names among which seven are journalists : Mladen Krnic, Zoran Erceg, Srecko Lorger, Ilija Marbic, Drazen Duilo, Ljubica Vuko - all from Split, and Smiljan Caknic from Korcula.

Of course there is no adduction of grounds for such a decision. What lawyer could assign reasons for such a prohibition? All the mentioned employees have been sent to forced leave at the beginning of October last year together with another group of ten employees of "Slobodna Dalmacija." The public already knows the reasons why they have been declared redundant, and the most sustainable proof that point in question is not the need to lay them off, is the number of those who have been engaged on part time or contractual bases, with their contracts being renewed every two months, and who were employed to discharge the work assignments of those who were on leave.

All these last months, those on "leave" have been receiving a minimum salary from "Slobodna" ( a little over two hundred thousand Croatian dinars in two monthly installments: This is approximately 60 DEM per month, and considering that their employment records are still in "Slobodna Dalmacija" their years of service are without interruption. On that basis they had the right to the "Christmas bonus", meaning that like all the other employees they received before Christmas a bottle of wine and a Pazin turkey. With the "present", came naturally an appropriate greeting card with the best wishes of the "director of the company, Ante Bubic", who was the same person who signed the decision regarding the forced leave of the above employees "for a period not longer than six months."

Not many of the employees "on leave", at least from among the journalists, verified on the spot the "effects" of the entrance prohibition into what are, at least formally,still their editorial offices. In other words, their salaries are to the main part brought to them by their colleagues, and they have no other reason to visit the organizatiron on whose payrole they are until they get their notices. Nevertheless, no one can a take lightly the fact they in this way too their are classified as "unsuitable."

Unfortunately, the case of the twenty employees from the "list of those on forced leave" is not isolated in "Slobodna Dalmacija." Since Spring, when the editorial board of the paper changed, there was a number of cases among journalists who gave notice, or those who were on sick leave, or whose part time employment ceased, who were turned back from the main entrance, since the doormen received orders to that effect "from above, i.e. the editorial office". They were not allowed to enter the premises even if by chance a ( former) colleague invited them to come in, without giving any kind of explanation, as was the case of those sent on "forced leave". As far as it is known in Split, such an example of no addmitance has never been registered anywhere alse.

LJUBICA VUKO