IS MACEDONIA GOING THE ALREADY TRAVERSED WAY?

Although it may sound very pessimistic, the relations between Macedonians and Albanians are again assuming extremely negative tendencies, and if such a trend is continued Macedonia can hardly escape what we have already seen on the territories of the former Yugoslavia.

It is well known that Macedonia is the only former Yugoslav republic which gained its independence in a peaceful way. Since the referendum and adoption of the Declaration of Independence in 1990 till today, despite economic hardships and the blockade of its northern and southern borders, it had succeeded in maintaining internal stability. The relations between the two most numerous populations, the Macedonians and the Albanians have, despite frequent tensions, been one of the foundations of that stability. An essential factor in all this was the participation of Albanian parties in the previous parliament and the two last Cabinets. What is then threatening to destabilize this "oasis of peace", as it is called with pathos.

At the end of last year, a group of Albanian intellectuals announced their intention to form a university in the Albanian language in Tetovo, a city with the largest number of Albanian inhabitants. The Macedonian authorities took the attitude that the establishment of such a university was unconstitutional and illegal, and that they would prevent its establishment by all legal means. Then the roof of the building in which instruction was to take place was pulled down, the offices of the rector were sealed, informative talks were conducted with people from the organizing committee, their flats were searched without the necessary warrants, and audio and video materials related to the university were seized...

Emotions and passions on both sides reached a dangerous temperature. The initiators of the Tetovo university held a secret meeting with representatives of all Albanian parties, including those having representatives in Parliament and the Government. At the end, the participants in the gathering signed an act on the establishment of the university. The Macedonian media, both state owned and private attacked this act as an attempt to federalize and Kosovize the state, while the Albanian ones, again both state and private, reported on this historic act for the Albanians and the exercise of their fundamental human rights.

At one point it seemed that the newly-created political atmosphere would prevent the forming of the new Cabinet, with the participation of the Albanian Party for Democratic Prosperity (PDP). The Liberal Party, which is the second strongest party in the victorious coalition of the Alliance for Macedonia abstained from voting on the composition of the new Government. In the new year, both the authorities and the media under their influence seem to have put down the ball, which was explained by the announced visits of numerous representatives, in this or that way, involved in the settling of the crisis in the former Yugoslavia, from Matthew Nimitz who delivered Clinton's letter to Gligorov, the mediators Owen and Stoltenberg, the High Commissioner for Minorities, Van der Stool, and mediator Gerd Ahrens.

Approximately at that time, PDP leader, Abdurahman Aliti, in an interview to the Pristina-Skoplje weekly Koha, described these events as the beginning of a new strategy towards the Albanians in the region, mentioning the possibility that the Macedonian Government in concert with some of its neighbours wished to take advantage of marginal events to prevent political action of the Albanians. The grey eminence of the seceded wing of PDP, Menduh Thaci, in an interview to Slobodna Dalmacija, considering Macedonia his state, negating wishes for Pan-Albanian unification, nevertheless stated: "It would be best for the Macedonian authorities to accept civilized methods in respect of the Albanians, otherwise, there is no other alternative but to apply rougher ones".

It is common knowledge that Albanians were denied rights in the area of education, secondary and higher, in the second half of the 80's, after Milosevic's Serbia took measures in Kosovo in direct solidarization with that trend. After the first free elections the Albanians believed that the same should be restored through Parliament and the Goverment in which they participated. At least declaratively there existed political will in that respect between the coalition partners in the previous government. Instruction in the Albanian language began, and the coverage of those completing elementary school in Albanian and continuing their education rose from some twenty to a bit over forty percent, which is nevertheless small, as compared to Macedonians (95%). One of the reasons for resistance to such measures was the lack of highly skilled teaching staff.

Since 1986 to date, Macedonia has practically had no institutions providing high or higher education in the Albanian language, which is a condition for employing the lacking teachers. Thus, there are no teachers, but there are also no possibilities to train them. The Pristina University in the Albanian language has been closed, and Tirana admits only 200 foreign students. There is still no instruction in Albanian at the Skoplje teacher training college, which should prepare teachers for elementary education. The proposal of the Union of Albanian Intellectuals for opening a teacher training college in Albanian received no reply. Only the announced establishment of the illegal university in Tetovo forced the Council of the University of Skoplje to bring a decision to establish one. As if the political will to solve the problem within the system has vanished, and doubts that it will be solved in that way are growing. Not only in the area of education, but also of information, representation in state bodies, etc.

Thus, events surrounding the Tetovo university, and the two-month boycott of instruction on the part of Albanian students at the Skoplje teacher training college, where the management refuses to implement the already adopted decision of the competent ministry for the beginning of instruction in Albanian and the holding of a debate on the right of official use of the nationality language at the local level in places where they constitute a majority, as well as the expelling of about 20 Albanians from Kosovo, participants in the proclamation of the Kacanica-Kosovo constitution and the detention of accredited correspondents from Kosovo, directly resulted in the homogenization of the Albanian political corps on an ethnic basis. A paradoxical situation has been created.

The PDP, which participates in the government, openly supports the university, which is for that same government unconstitutional and illegal. The leader of this party and his Cabinet ministers have signed the act on its establishment, together with representatives of the seceded wing whom they did not even talk to after the split in the PDP. They were joined by the first president of the PDP, which they actually jointly relieved of office. On the Macedonian side, when Albanians are in question, there were practically no major political differences. All this was reflected on the relations between Macedonia and Albania, which are, officially, still assessed as good.

In his last interview to the Paris Figaro, Gligorov claims that there are no problems in relations with Albania, although only several days later his office, after the statement of Sali Berisa to the effect that during a meeting with Gligorov in Krakow he insisted on the rights of Albanians in the area of education as one of the foundations of the stability of Macedonia on which he insists, informed that he had told his colleague that the Tetovo university was in contravention of the Macedonian Constitution and laws, and that problems have to be solved through democratic dialogue in the institutions of the system.

The Tetovo university and the passions it has aroused are only further proof of Macedonia's path along the Bosnian recipe. In pure and closed ethnic circles, in which there is no space for differences in stances on crucial national interests, parties and politicians compete to be the greatest protectors of the same. With the all-out support of the media in their mother tongue. This competition results in increasingly radical demands and options, because one side always demands for itself what the other side is not given. Those taking the helm of their closed circle speak to the "others". In the beginning, negotiations and compromises function, everything can be agreed upon - even participation in the government.

By the nature of things, problems arise when "our" rights collide with "their rights". In the end, there is nothing else to do except for one side to rally and leave Parliament and the government, proclaim its autonomy, form its Parliament and institutions. And such a possibility was announced in the mentioned interview by PDP leader Aliti, current vice-president of the Macedonian Parliament, a man who hardly anyone could call an Albanian radical. Does this mean that Popova Sapka, a well-known ski center near Tetovo will become the center of seceded Albanians in Macedonia? Regrettably, this does not sound too unlikely. It has already been seen on the example of Croatia after the first elections and Bosnia before war broke out. And things in Macedonia seem to be taking that course, which slowly but surely destroys the picture of its democratization, aspirations towards a multiethnic state, an enclave in the Balkans where co-habitation is possible.

An indicator of the situation is also the attempt of the Helsinki Committee on Human Rights which organized a meeting between Macedonian and Albanian intellectuals on the problem of education. Both sides were cautious, and few were those who tried soberly to discuss the problem, who naturally, had to abandon the ethnic cliche, and were "by their own side" proclaimed national traitors. Needless to say, most adhered to "their" national cliches.

The official authorities seem to be afraid of losing the state if things take a course of further discord on national grounds. According to some statements, that is strengthening ties between Belgrade and Skoplje. The visit of Zoran Djindjic, first explained as a visit by a Serbian parliamentarian (!?), and then as a party visit, is, nevertheless, an enigma. The delegation was received by the president of Parliament and the President of the Republic, and well-informed sources claim that only liberals - members of the government knew about it. This means that neither the prime minister, nor other Cabinet members knew anything about it.

The question now is whether the danger from the internal destablization of Macedonia represents a motive to solve the problems of Kosovo and Western Macedonia as a package arrangement, which would actually mean that the Macedonian part of the government sees no other solution to its problems with the Albanians except in a return to the time when in the former SFRY that was done synchronously with Belgrade. That would be a further argument in support of the thesis that small states in the Balkans are not a guarantee of its stability. Reliable sources claim that during his last visit to Macedonia, David Owen presented precisely this to Gligorov, as the position of British diplomacy, seeing salvation for Macedonia only in its acceding to the latest Yugoslavia or Greater Serbia. Both offer only a new and bloodier war, and the only possible losers may be Macedonians - they will lose both the state and nation.

Iso Rusi