FROM "THE RED BAND" TO "YELLOW COMPANY"

Quarrels between the Serbian opposition

AIM, BELGRADE. January 27, 1995 The Serbian opposition is passing through a period of its deepest crisis since parliamentarianism was introduced in

1. In four municipalities where the opposition has come to power in 1993 elections, coercive measures were introduced, and the quarrels between the former so-called "united opposition" are acquiring the propostions of a galloping scandal. Mutual accusations for malversations are severe and persistently repeated to such an extent that they will probably destroy the moral credibility of the opposition.

The worst was in Belgrade municipality Stari grad, the central municipality where the so-called "democratic opposition" or "united opposition" so far always defeated the socialists. This affair reveals that the new authorities suffer from such an unnegligible extent of corruptness just like the old ones, but that it is not capable to conceal it, as the well trained socialistic regime used to. The quarrels at the same time reveal a new political configuration in Serbia. That is why, before digging deeper into the spicy details about the outbreaking scandals, it is necessary to look into a sketch of the actors and the atmosphere it is taking place in.

Political forces which are acting against Slobodan Milosevic's regime are divided into three blocks: One is formed by Seselj's Radicals and other small ultra-nationalistic groups close to them which stick to the old rhetorics, but just slightly tactically supplemented with demands for access to the media and loud accusations of the regime for perpetrated crimes. They still speak of "treason", with the only difference that they include the authorities among the "traitors". After leaving the prison where he had spent four months because of the incidents that took place in the Assembly of Yugoslavia, the leader of Serbian Radicals, Dr. Vojislav Seselj, is facing a split in his own party. While he was in prison, a dissident Radical deputy club was formed in the Chamber of Citizens of the Federal Assembly, the president of which, Jovan Glamocanin, organized a founding assembly of the new Serbian Radical Party "Nikola Pasic" (SRSNP) just two days before Seselj came out of jail, on January 27. The new party was joined by the Radical Party of Serbia, which was also previously formed by dissidents of Seselj's party after the 1993 elections. Brcin's Borba, which belongs to the state, published the news about foundation of the new party on the front page of its weekend double issue.

The second group consists of "national democrats", such as the Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS) of Vojislav Kostunica, the Democratic Party (DS) of Zoran Djindjic, and the Depos of Slobodan Rakitic, which has left the Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO) because of its shift towards the civic option. Rakitic will also be holding his founding assembly of the new party which declares itself as "Christian Democratic". Members of this group do not use war rhetorics, but criticize Milosevic's break-up with Karadzic and the offered peace plan of the Contact Group.

The third group is formed of the Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO) of Vuk Draskovic who demands immediate interruption of the war, criticizes the regime and state media for not being too convincing about the advantages of peace, for sharp opposition to Karadzic and the war lobby. It maintains correct coalition relations with the Civic Alliance of Serbia, the party which was engaged the most in the attempts to liberate him from jail in 1993, and towards which he expressed protective loyalty at the time of its persistent anti-war activities in 1992 and 1993. On the other hand, he maintained his fixed idea about the Ravna gora movement of general Mihajlovic, the Chetnik leader in the Second World War, to whom he devoted his latest book, "the Night of the General".

New Democracy (ND) of Dusan Mihajlovic is "something in between" the Serbian Renewal Movement and the regime - it still identifies itself as an opposition party, but has ministers in the Serbian Government. This Government, whose ministers are at the same time directors of the largest enterprises and big systems, is striving to place the greatest possible economic and public institutions under its control, and to preserve the Governor of the National Bank Avramovic by all means - even on state infusion, for having contributed to stability of the authorities and the feeling of the citizens that they have "overcome the crisis" after hyper-inflation.

A new layesr of private-owners, many of them war profiteers or at least "patriotic profiteers", who have grown rich by "breaking the sanctions", are holding on to the authorities and might be one of the reasons for the scandals.

How is such a situation reflected on political life?

On October 3, 1994, the SPO assessed that the only program of the President of DS, Zoran Djindjic was "with Seselj against Vuk, with Karadzic against peace, with Kostunica against Seselj, on television against crime, and in reality

• to grab as much as possible on account of misery of the confused people". The SPO poses the question: "why was Zoran Djindjic panic-stricken when publishing of data on war profiteering was mentioned and about some of the party leaders having become rich overnight". The SPO claims that leaders of the SPO who were expelled from this party for having reached out for malversations in Stari grad municipality, could not be removed from the posts they held "because they were whole-heartedly welcomed and protected by Djindjic's deputies in this municipality." The DS responds with accusations that the SPO is the knobstick of the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS). Towards the end of January, in a sharp tone, Vuk Draskovic said that he would not be silent about the "yellow company (the colours of the party insignia of the DS are blue and yellow) any more, because it is the cancer of the Serbian opposition", which "for reasons of marketing devours an ox in Pale, and for financial, perhaps, smuggles arms for the Muslims". The SPO had claimed before that it had "cleansed its ranks of profiteers, while Djindjic, not only failed to act like that with his profiteers, but gave protection to the moral waste of he SPO".

Deputies of the DS and the DSS have replaced the president of the Belgrade municipality Sari grad, Jovan Kazic, who is a member of the SPO, accusing him that "out of personal interest and interest of the political group he belongs to, he had sought the assistance in ruining his own municipality of those who are striving to prevent its functioning from the very beginning of its constitution as an opposition municipality". Director of "Stari Grad Business Premises" enterprise, Milenko Nikic, was chosen to be the new President, who was previously, in a letter addressed to the Republican authorities, accused by the former President for malversations with business premises. Due to all that, the SPO expelled the Director of Business Premises, Milenko Nikic, from the party, and later a member of the Executive Board, Srdjan Kovicic, and the deputy Srdjan Opacic as well, but, as they claim, the Democratic Party offered them protection.

Before the New Year's eve, responding to Kazic's letter, the Serbian Government dissolved the Assembly of the municipality and all its agencies, and introduced the so-called "stopgap measures", demanded that the Serbian Assembly schedule elections and established a temporary "coercive agency" headed by Kazic again, and consisting of three representatives of the ruling party and three from the SPO. The DSS accused the Government after that for acting illegally and with bias, and reminded it that for more than a year it had pointed out to abuses and malversations in the municipality, and that it had considered the recent President, Jovan Kazic, greatly responsible for the situation. Before the last elections, this party sharply accused the municipal authorities for giving apartments away neglecting the procedure, and after that the coalition between the DSS and the SPO within the former Depos finally split up. The DS answered that it did not use a single square meter of business premises in the municipality, and that "by insight into documentation, it was established that the Serbian Renewal Movement used more than 1,000 square metres of business premises in the municipality without any compensation.

In the beginning of December, during the election campaign for supplementary local elections in another municipality with the opposition in power, the President of the Committee of the Socialist Party of Serbia claimed that the DS used its participation in the authorities and that it signed the agreement on a lease of the building of the former embassy of Iran at a price lower than its market value, and for an area lower than the actual one... The proposal of deputies of the SPO for dismissal of the President of another Belgrade municipality, Vracar, Dragan Marsicanin , was rejected. A deputy of the SPO, Ljubisa Stanojevic, claimed that Marsicanin was giving business premises to donors from the DSS, and Marsicanin claimed that was not true and that Ljubisa Stanojevic was waving with "some pieces of paper for the journalists in his apartment, standing under a painting which he had never been paid for and which was the subject of criminal charges."

The opposition authorities in Topola municipality were also dismissed after a scandal which broke out when a private owner was issued a permit to build a restaurant at the entrance to Oplenac, in the vicinity of the village cemetery. The SPO claims that the permit was issued by the Socialists, and reaffimed by the deputies of the DS and the DSS...

And so on, and so forth.

When the Socialists, after a series of lost local elections last autumn (which is a sign that the voters did not punish the opposition for the scandals and quarrels) announced that they would amend the election law on the local level and turn it into a single-round knock-out system, the quarrelled opposition decided to unite again.

The ideas of a single opposition list of candidates were first proposed by the Radicals; then a similar initiative, although somewhat mitigated ("technical coalition") was presented by Djindjic in the name of DS, which was supported by Kostunica, and finally, Vuk Draskovic, propsed his version of a union which implies an agreement on adoption of a law on privatization, depolitization of the police and return of Karadjordjevic dynasty into the country. After another salvo of accusations between the DS and the SPO, an agreement on parliamentary cooperation in the Republican Assembly followed. A coordinating body was formed of representatives of all the opposition deputy groups, but this probably does not mean much.

The idea about an institutional union of DS and the DSS is more significant, as well as their intention to form a kind of a national block with the Serbian Radical Party. Control of the Government, reconsideration of the ruling policy, protection of fundamental civic values are jobs which will have to wait for better times, until "new wine ripens in old barrels". In other words, the opposition, whatever that might mean in Serbia, has not proved to be up to its task - to be the bearer of the announced moral revival. Whether framed-up or not, the scandals in the municipalities compromised pluralistic democracy. From the aspect of public interest, the new "transparency of the authorities", maybe is not that bad - one can easily realize that the regime is not impeccable. Basically, all the quarrels are just a sign that the political confrontation line between the "red gang" and "the forces of chaos and folly" (as the regime called the opposition in 1991) is not in the same place any more. The tectonics of Serbian political corpus has now become much more complex.

Milan Milosevic