TRUMP CARDS FOR THE ENDING

The Albanians in Montenegro do not renounce their demand for a special status

Summary: The Democratic Forum of Albanians in Montenegro has recently renewed its demand for a special status of this ethnic group in Montenegro. Both the authorities and the opposition are against such a demand. The Memorandum which included the demand for a special status was adopted two years ago, but due to the ill success of the Democratic Alliance in the latest elections in Montenegro, it was pushed to the margins and almost forgotten. The Memorandum is based on the presumption that the interests of the Albanians are ignored in the post-communist Montenegro and that the Albanians are inferior, even discriminated against in all spheres. Is the renewal of the demand for a special status the result of an assessment that the "Albanian issue" is slowly becoming the topical issue on the agenda of Balkan and international institutions? The authors of the Memorandum claim that adoption of the special status for Montenegrin Albanians would "contribute to national and civic equality" and that it would "represent a sound basis for defining relations between different ethnic groups in Montenegro". Despite disagreements and variances between the leaders of the two Albanian parties in Montenegro, their stance concerning the special status is identical - they are all in favour. In spite of everything that has happened in the past few years, though, the traditionally good between the Montenegrins and the Albanians are still not disturbed to such an extent to cause concern, so this is a solid foundation for talks on all controversial issues.

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The Democratic Forum of Albanians in Montenegro, on September 12, 1992, adopted a document called the Memorandum on a Special Status of Albanians in Montenegro. As a minimum, it stated the demand for a special status of the Albanians and for talks concerning this issue to be held through foreign mediators. Pursuant Item 2, Article 35 of the Copenhagen Final Document on Human Rights, and the principled stances of the Peace Conference on Former Yugoslavia, the document demanded that London Conference opened a debate about the position of the Albanians in Montenegro and, of course, that it recognized their special status in this Republic.

This document attracted considerable attention of the public, but suspicion too, both in the part inclined towards the party in power, and in the part which preferred one of the two leading opposition parties. The text of the Memorandum was critically assessed from different angles. While the Serbian opposition parties recognized primarily the larva of a future secessionist butterfly in it, the Montenegrin opposition block emphasized its irrational tendency to isolate Montenegrin Albanians in a specific ghetto.

This Memorandum on a Special Status was almost completely forgotten, among other, thanks to the fact that the Albanians were pushed to the margins after the latest elections in Montenegro. Their only political party at the time, the Democratic Alliance of the Albanians, did not win seats in the Parliament, so the public was deprived of even the slighest insight into the political life of the Albanians. Another thing which contributed to the Memorandum's sinking into oblivion was that the organized political forces of the Albanians in this Republic were not united about the question whether the validity of the adopted demands should be tested by a referendum and the authorities and the opposition thus confronted to the end, but also the fact that the international factors did not demonstrate the expected benevolence concerning the demands in the document. Recently, however, the Democratic Forum of Albanians in Montenegro decided to renew the Memorandum and move the issue from the standstill.

In formulation of the Memorandum on a Special Status, the Democratic Forum of the Albanians started from several presumptions which were expected to lead to the conclusion that the interests of the Albanians in Montenegro were permanently ignored in the post-communist period. The Memorandum stated that the Albanians were concerned because of their unequal position in relation to the Montenegrins, that they even felt discriminated in the sphere of the economy, culture and information. it was also stated that the Albanians were neglected due to a lack of institutions and associations for development and promotion of their culture and national identity. The use of their mother tongue and script in the administration and in public life was also mentioned in the context, as well as the fact that emigation of the Albanian population continued incessantly together with colonization, "in a perfidious manner", of non-Albanian population of the regions where the Albanians used to live. The Albanians, as it was also stated in the Memorandum, were not proportionally represented not only in all the central institutions, but in local administration as well. For that reason, and in the name of its ethnic group, the Democratic Forum considered special status, as a form of modern autonomy, to be beneficial to the ethnic and civic equality and to be a sound basis for precise defining of relations in Montenegro - between the Albanians, the Muslims, the Montenegrins and others.

The Memorandum on a Special Status of the Albanians in Montenegro was written at the time when the new Republican Constitution had not yet been adopted, but the Democratic Forum warned the public, while the public dispute about it lasted, that the text of the constitution was by its nature national, and not civic, and that everybody but the Montenegrins would be unequal should it be adopted without amendments. This assessment served as a foundation for the demand on the necessity to incorporate the provisions on a special status into the Constitution, as a form of social organization which was in compliance with the documents of the International Conference on Yugoslavia.

Is the present reaching out for a document which is more than two years old simply a matter of political inertia or a result of the assessment that time has come for reassertion of previously stipulated demands? In the attempt to find the answer to this question one should not overlook that there is a certain amount of inertia in it. The Memorandum was revived at the annual assembly of the Democratic Forum, and there was nothing more natural than to stress an old idea in default of new ones. Truly, in the meantime, political unity of the Albanians in Montenegro was disturbed, but not to the extent to devalue the demands for a special status. The Democratic Alliance of the Albanians is not the only political party of this ethnic group any more, but its faction which developed into the Democratic Union of the Albanians in the beginning of the year, did not renounce the text of the Memorandum either. On the contrary, at its promotive press conference, it was stated that the Memorandum was the political plarform of the newly-established party and that it would do its best to revive the Memorandum on a special status. The Democratic Alliance of the Albanians did not abandon the demand for a special status either, although it seems that the relationship between Mehmed Bardhi, President of the Democratic Alliance, and the President of the Democratic Forum, Dzerxh Dzokaj (?), are not quite idyllic. The Democratic Forum thus turned out to be a political body which gathers representatives of Albanian political parties, associatins and respected individuals, but representatives of the Democratic Alliance of the Albanians did not attend its latest Assembly session. Mr. Bardhi's statement: "We do not know what the President of the Association, Dzerxh Dzokaj is doing, who will stand behind him if we are not there" is an illustration of strained relations, but not of any disagreement about the major demand of Montenegrin Albanians.

One could conclude that the time for complying with the Memorandum demand is not more favourable now than it was two years ago. It is a fact, though, that step by step, the moment of resolution of the Yugoslav crisis is approaching, and that the Albanians are counting on that. Renewal of the demand for a special status reveals an effort to introduce as many trump cards as possible into the ending of the game, in view of the national program of the Albanians in the entire space of former Yugoslavia. The Albanians in Montenegro cannot hide (even if they wanted to) that they are acting within a more or less clearly established political goal. Just like all the others in the former Yugoslav space who are not abandoning their autistic political projects, the Albanians are not showing any sense for reassessment of their ideas, plans and demands.

The Montenegrin authorities did not react to this renewal of the former demands of the Albanians, but they are probably closely watching what is happening. The opposition stated its stance concerning this issue only after journalists asked them to comment on it, but offered nothing new in relation to what it stated two years ago. Secretary General of the Liberal Alliance of Montenegro, Predrag Vulikic, just interpreted the former attitude that "noone in Montenegro should be given a special status, since Montenegro should be constituted as a state of all its sitizens". The Liberals believe that a special status would lead the Albanians into a specific ghetto. Montenegrin Social Democrats came to the same conclusion, and their Vice-president, Mihailo Vujosevic, says: "the Albanians in Montenegro should not be shut away in any way, not even the zones of a special status, but opened to other citizens and the world". The President of the most powerful Serbian opposition party in Montenegro (the National Party), Dr. Novak Kilibarda, is, just as he used to be, opposed to any kind of administrative and territorial particularity or autonomy of the Albanians, expressing a readiness to "give the rights in complieance with the highest standards prescribed by the United Nations to all the national minorities in Montenegro, as well as in the FRY".

Since both the Montenegrin authorities and the opposition deny that the demand for special status of the Albanians in Montenegro is justified, they should listen out to the part of their arguments about unequality and discrimination much more attentively. The attitude of Montenegrin Albanians towards the state they live in and towards Montenegrins as the majority nation, regardless of the strain provoked by these "evil times", never came near intolerance. This is a serious precondition for a dialogue and understanding, but whether that is the direction which will be taken or any other - it is not opportune to predict.

DUSKO VUKOVIC AIM Podgorica (