CRUMBLING OF AUTOCRATIC POWER

AIM, ZAGREB, May 19, 1994

The blockade of the Assembly and the parliamentary crisis which had shaken up Croatian political scene for the past two months ended up in a compromise. The Presidents of the two Assembly Chambers, Stipe Mesic and Josip Manolic, who had decided two months ago to break off from the Croatian Democratic Community (HDZ) and a better part of its policy, achieved most of their short-term objectives they had announced when they promoted their new party - the Croatian Independent Democrats. The Croatian Democratic Community and President Tudjman will draw certain satisfaction from the fact that Mesic and Manolic will withdraw from the duties of presidents of the Assembly Chambers, and enable election of their men instead. The opposition, especially Budisa's Croatian Social Liberal Party (HSLS), has perhaps got the most out of this - its position in the Croatian Parliament is strengthened. This could be the summary of the agreement signed by authorized representatives of all Croatian parliamentary parties on Wednesday night in the Chamber of Districts, after a two-day session that could be called a "lecture on procedure".

Only the first issue of the agreement is to measure of the ruling Croatian Democratic Community. Even that not quite so, because, although the HDZ had got what it had insisted on - to have the Presidents of the Assembly Chambers elected from among its members, and to have Mesic and Manolic withdraw from these positions now they had left the HDZ - the ardent desire of the majority of the HDZ representatives did not come true after all - to eliminate them in a voting stampedo of the Assembly majority they definitely still hold in the Chamber of Districts and just on paper in the Chamber of Representatives. And only time will show if that is actually the case. On the other hand, Mesic and Manolic conditioned their withdrawal by an inter-party agreement and a redestribution of the Assembly positions which would reflect the new ratio of political powers in the Assembly. In this they succeeded.

From now on, the opposition will have two vice-presidents in each of the Chambers, instead of one it had so far. What's more, it will hold the positions of the "first" vice-presidents, i.e. the ones who replace the presidents in case of his inability to carry out the duty. It appears that both positions will be taken by Budisa's Liberals. The other vice-presidential position in the Chamber of Representatives will be, most probably, taken by Stipe Mesic. The HDZ and the representatives of the minorities will keep their two, i.e. one vice-presidency in the Chamber of Representatives, respectively, and the HDZ will be left without its vice-presidency in the Chamber of Districts. This means that the HDZ has lost its majority of votes in the Presidency of the Assembly, consisting of its Presidents and Vice-Presidents, who are in charge of preparations for the sessions.

Assembly committees will also change their party composition. Besides the fact that their number has increased, redestribution of presidential positions and the composition of the committees according to the new party proportions among the representatives will take place. The HDZ and the opposition parliamentary parties will be assigned as many presidential positions as belong to them, according to the number of their representatives. In the committees where the HDZ will preside, it will have an insignificant number of members, and the opposition will hold the position of the vice-president. In the committees in which the opposition will hold the presidency, the HDZ will have its vice-president and an equal number of members as the opposition. It is also important that the obligation to elaborate new rules of procedure of the Assembly Chambers within 90 days was made part of the agreement, to replace those which were written according to the taste of the ruling HDZ. These new rules of procedure will have to be made "on the model of the rules of procedure of European countries with developed democracy". This ought to introduce more of a democratic spirit into the procedure in which the ruling party will not be able to use provisions of the rules for elimination and blunting of all opposition proposals and initiatives. And should secret voting be introduced, as the opposition demands, and a part of HDZ representatives as well, the entire role of the Assembly will considerably improve. Party restraints which until now practically turned the Assembly into a mere voting machine and the executor of the orders issued by party leaders will practically cease to exist and put the Assembly itself into an entirely new position, as well as President Tudjman, the Government and other bodies of the executive authorities. They will not be able to count on the mere transmission of decisions reached by party leaders, because the representatives will enjoy full freedom and independence in decision-making and carrying out their duties.

Should the agreement of parliamentary parties actually begin functioning on Monday and Tuesday, when the session of the Assembly Chambers is scheduled, the tension caused in the entire political life of Croatia by the conflict between Mesic's and Manolic's independent democrats and Tudjman's HDZ will take a new turn. The conflict, better to say, the open war, culminated at the session of the Assembly itself. It revealed all the incompetence of the HDZ, its powerlessness to function otherwise than by application of "terrorism of the majority". Although the creators and the organizers of its political functioning had two whole months to find solution for replacement of Mesic and Manolic in an optimum democratic procedure, the only thing they had come up with was to carry out their execution, by calling their representatives to discipline, as usual, exerting various forms of pressure even, relying solely on the majority of votes they have in the Parliament. Had they anyone else against them, and not Mesic and Manolic who know the HDZ from within only too well, and all the intricacies of the procedure incorporated into Assembly rules which give almost unlimited power to the presidents of the Chambers, they might have even succeeded again. But this time, the past two-day session of the Chamber of Districts, which the HDZ intended to use to dismiss Manolic right at the beginning and elect its own President, pushing aside all other issues and probably striving to show all its remaining members how any infidelity will be efficiently and drastically punished, turned into Manolic's and oppositionist lecturing on parliamentary procedure.

The angry HDZ majority for an almost infinite number of times tried to put on the agenda as the first two issues the dismissal of Manolic and election of the new president of the Chamber. And whenever this objective seemed at hand, skilfully using the powers given to him by the rules of procedures, Manolic infinitely postponed the final vote. He even managed to show them, with synchronized support of the opposition, that, had they accepted his draft agenda with his dismissal as its last issue, they would have completed the task sooner. Because, during the two whole days they could get nowhere from the beginning: from the adoption of the agenda, and that is exactly how much time they would have needed to get through the entire Manolic's draft agenda. Now, they will have to wait for Monday and the continuation of the session, when Manolic will resign by his free will and in great style, referring to the inter-party agreement, leaving the majority of HDZ representatives even without the meagre satisfaction to dismiss him. And a part of them, mostly members of the hard-core faction which forms the majority in the Party now, will never get over it. Not only because they have not succeeded in getting rid of Manolic the way they intended to, but just as much because for the first time they found themselves in a situation where their will was not carried out in the Assembly as they have planned and wished. It was interesting, for example, to watch Drago Krpina shout from the balcony of the Chamber of Districs at the HDZ representatives for having allowed Damir Zoric left by Manolic to chair the session, interrupt the session and call its continuation for as late as Thursday morning, postponing in this way Manolic's dismissal for after the inter-party agreement. Not even the answer that they could do nothing about it, because it was Zoric's right could pacify him. Thus the members of this hard-core faction, tottered around the Assembly corridors and halls, loudly protesting for being unable to do anything to carry out their intentions despite their being in majority. They simply could not understand that, by passing on to the side of the opposition, Manolic could have taken with him the power given to him as the president of the Chamber while he belonged to the majority. By this act he obviously caused an escalation of hatred and revengefulness among his former party colleagues that could be almost felt in the air. While at it, they had not even noticed that a part of the HDZ representatives had also grown silent, voting according to directives only because of party restraints, careful not to become the victims of the merciless party grindstone themselves, but highly dissatisfied with what was happening. This is the problem President Tudjman will have to cope with very soon. Because, just as much as he had suffered from the loss of the moderate part of the HDZ, he will feel the growing problems with the remaining hard-core, considerably compromised HDZ faction whose power "rests mainly in sheer force". The very fact that Tudjman had to call the Foreign Minister, Mate Granic, to join in the negotiations in order to reach the agreement with the opposition, speaks for itself. It is obvious that present HDZ leaders in the Assembly are not only incapable of reaching a compromise with the opposition, but with the moderate members of the HDZ as well, pushing them to leave their ranks. Even those who did not follow Mesic and Manolic only out of their blind obedience to President Tudjman, could not endure it. Since during the session of the Chamber of Districts, Mladen Vedric, the former mayor of Zagreb and the current President of the Chamber of the Economy of Croatia left the HDZ for that very reason and for the time being joined the independent representatives, announcing that a part of other members of the HDZ from among managers would do the same, including even the former Prime Minister, the influential Franjo Greguric, and even the present Prime Minister, Nikica Valentic, it is becoming quite clear that Tudjman will finally remain alone surrounded only by people like Seks, Susak, Glavas, Milas, Vukojevic... And, the men from his Presidential office, of course. And then, the issue will be how much longer will he be able to control this faction of Seks's. It was, after all, the first to show its teeth to him. And Mesic and Manolic will in this way, despite the loss of the presidential positions in the Assembly, reach fully their major objective: differentiation in Croatian Democratic Community. Drifting away of its membership will continue to weaken its inviolable power, which could eventually even free Croatia of the present autocratic rule of Tudjman and his party. By signing the inter-party agreement, the Croatian Assembly managed to lift considerably this autocratic rule off its shoulder, and time will show whether this will spread on to the whole of Croatia.

(7 pages)

ZORAN DASKALOVIC