TUZLA IN A PERNICIOUS ENCICLEMENT

AIM, SPLIT, November 12, 1994

"I speak in the name of my daugter married to a Serb, in the name of my son married to a Muslim and in my own name. I am in my uniform since April 4, 1992 and I will not take it off until this evil is defeated, until fascism is defeated. I am in favour of peace, but there is no other way out. But this victory will mean nothing, if we do not defeat the evil morally as well. And it may be even more difficult to fight at this other front than at the military one." That is how Alojz Knezevic, an elderly Croat and a soldier of the Army of B&H spoke, addressing the participants of the international conference titled "Can Europe do without Multi-Culture" held in Tuzla under the auspices of the President of the European Parliament, Klaus Hansch, from October 3 to 5 1994. About a hundred participants from all parts of former Yugoslavia and about fifteen from European and American states came to Tuzla, among other, to see for themselves that in the ethnically massacred Bosnia there exist those who still resist the bloody frenzy together.

This warning uttered by Knezevic acquires a special meaning in Tuzla which is still a symbol of such resistance, a rare oasis where people are still trying to oppose national fundamentalism which is becoming law not only through aggression but also defence. Sejfudin Tokic, a member of the B&H Parliament will unwillingly thank the gentlemen from Europe for the compliments uttered during their political safaris, who praise the example of Tuzla, because, he claims, it is not true that Tuzla is just a rare oasis of multinational living in spite of the war, but many Bosnians are actually, held as hostages by their national oligarchies, prevented to do so, mostly due to the very support certain European gentlemen had offered to these very same oligarchies. "We are afraid it might happen to Tuzla too", Tokic says. While the Army of B&H is opening new fronts with increasing success, breaking military blockades - and opening better communication routes for Tuzla too, because in order to reach this city just from Vares, where the entrance to the Tuzla region is, to about a hundred kilometres distant Tuzla by a mountain road, it takes almost five hours, only if there are no problemns on the way - the political blockades are gaining in strength.

Tuzla where about 50 per cent of the population before the war were the Muslims, a little more than 15 per cent were the Serbs and approximately the same percentage the Croats, and almost 20 per cent of those who called themselves Yugoslavs, is the only city in Bosnia besides Vares where national parties did not win the so-called first democratic elections. Local authorities were formed by and representatives in the Parliament were the Reformists of the former Prime Minister, Ante Markovic, who have later become the Union of Bosnian Social Democrats, and who succeeded, although almost isolated, to organize successful defence of the city and later comparatively normal functioning of life in it. Neither did the Serbian aggression, nor the Croatian-Muslim war later on, cause internal national divisions and conflicts. Although about six thousand Serbs left the city in the very beginning with the former Yugoslav People's Army (JNA), more than 20 thousand of them still remain and many of them were in the first lines at the front. And on the otherwise extremely short lists of the international Red Cross of those who wish to return, there is an enormous number of Serbian inhabitants of Tuzla.

Petar Todorovic, one of the founders of the Serbian Consulting council in Tuzla, claims with authority that the Serbs cannot say that they are citizens of the second order which they could not avoid being elsewhere: "They are threatened it is true, but by the war, just like everybody else, and there is more of them leaving every day because of that, just like everybody else". Tuzla succeeded to avoid the Croatian-Muslim war, although many strove to light the fuse, from bomb-throwers of the Muslim Party of Democratic Action (SDA), Boban's terrorist missionaries, all the way down to messages from Zagreb sent to the local Croats that they should flee from here. But, Tuzla found an answer for that too, and instead of giving ardent speeches from the political platforms and church altars, the legendary mayor of Tuzla, Selim Beslagic and the first man of Tuzla parish, the guardian of the monatsery there, father Petar Matanovic, toured Croatian villages together, warranting that there will be no conflict with their personal authority.

Despite all that, or maybe because of that, a third front opened for the people from Tuzla - the one with the authorities from Sarajevo, from where open accusations began to arrive that the "reds" were following in the footsteps of Abdic and that they want a "state" of their own which they would sell to the Serbs later on. But, Tuzla authorities managed to resist even these provocations, letting them know that they do consider the authorities in Sarajevo legitimate, but that they would resolve the problems in their area without conflicts. At least without the unnecessary ones.

But, the effects of "waging" war on three different fronts began to show, and it became extremely difficult to remain a clear stream in Bosnian swampy surroundings, because it spoils the great agreements between small leaders, as one of the city leaders sarcastically stated. The inhabitants of Tuzla thus had the honour to be the first to experience the "benefits" of the abuse of the Washington agreement, the Balkan style. While everything has more or less remained just empty words on paper in the entire Bosnian Muslim-Croatian Federation, the first, Tuzla-the Drina River Valley, canton has already been formed and its authorities established. That Tuzla is a pioneer in this as in other matters should not surprise anyone, if it were not for the fact that behind such zeal of the central authorities stood the obvious possibility for the coalition of national parties - SDA and the Croatian Democratic Community-HDZ (The Serbian Democratic Party was, of course, dissolved) to take over almost absolute power in the canton, and pursuant to Constitutional authorities, practically in Tuzla as well.

What democratic procedure was employed in this is best illustrated by the fact that all the municipalities which form the canton have the same number of representatives in the canton Parliament - equally, Tuzla with almost two thirds of its inhabitants, and small municipalities with several thousand inhabitants living in them. It did not take long to feel the results of this "democratic" arithmetic. The canton authorities led by the SDA soon showed their power and took the well-known course where national political aptness is deciscive for everything. National cleansing of all structures reached by their authority (the army, police, numerous entreprises) progresses quickly, leaving behind national crevices, distrust, suspicion and insecurity. The process which was experienced by Sarajevo and which caused gradual loss of credibility of this multinational centre of Bosnian unity. Behind a mask of "Bosniandom" which was at first accepted by many Serbs and Croats although they are now slowly becoming alergic to it, Muslim fundamentalism which, truly, was the last to step on the scene, is spreading its influence. And its small coalition partner, the HDZ, even when things are not favourable for the Croats, silently passes over them hoping that they will get even somewhere else - from Herzegovina down to the demand that they should have a municipality of their own in Tuzla. Miki, one of the Serbs from the trenches from the beginning of the war, resignedly says that nothing is as it used to be : "What can it be like when we have some imams coming to our unit all the time, whose political speeches make even my Muslims wonder. They are dividing us, that's what they are doing. Those on top and those on the bottom. The first are getting more powerful, and the latter more numerous".

The city worn out by the war, with 200 thousand refugees who have passed through it, and about 60 thousand of them who have remained inevitably changing the physiognomy of the city, is quickly becoming a fertile ground for national political manipulations. What it managed to resist during all these war years is now slowly wearing away its foundations like the salt mines the city lived on for centuries. It is becoming more difficult to explain both to the Serbs and the Croats that city authorities are losing power and that the new political trends are cut out somewhere else. Patience is disappearing and departures are multiplying, and the space for the warriors who thank the Allah for everything and wish to claim more rights for themselves than the others on account of the terrible sacrifices of the Muslim people in this war. It is becoming clear that it is not only the Army of B&H that is taking the offensive. National trenches are being dug even where it was impossible before. Some would say, unpleasant witnesses who could testify that Bosnia could have taken another road should be removed. The number of fighters for the second front old Alojz Knezevic was talking about is decreasing, and, like the citizens of Tuzla, they are in an encirclement which is difficult to break through.

STOJAN OBRADOVIC