TUDJMAN'S FIXED IDEAS
AIM Zagreb, May 22, 1996
Croatia will experience Tienanmen - that is how Novi list from Rijeka forecasts the outcome of Tudjman's battle for Zagreb which he lost in the elections six months ago but still refuses to let go. The split between the authorities and the people is deeepening, and in a way the situation reminds of the one from back in 1990. The metaphor of the relation is the conflict between the head of the state and fans of football club "Dinamo" which has been cooking for a long time, but reached its climax in the past few days, turning demands for the return of the "sacred name Dinamo" into a sort of a resistance movement.
In just six years, Tudjman's relationship with "Dinamo" and its fans has passed the path from worshipping to curses. On the eve of multiparty elections it could be heard in football stadiums: "Franjo, Franjo, Dinamo, Dinamo". The "Bad Blue Boys" clearly expressed their choice: "BBB for HDZ". The communist authorities at the time tried to end the idyll by removing advertisements of the HDZ from stadiums, but this did not help them at all, indeed it might have even harmed them.
Tudjman's blue favourites were also in the front rows when the war began. Politics stimulated the so-called self-organization of fans, and that is how it came about that youngsters who were under age put on uniforms of volunters. They did not spare themselves, so many of them were killed. In the meantime, their club, by a wish from the highest instance, was changing its name. The historian from the Presidential Palace, zealous in destroying traces of everything that was happening here in the past five decades, instead of the despicable "Dinamo" - which reminded him of socialism, Yugoslavia, the land across the Drina river - he was inventing a new name which would correspond to the mission he assigned to the Zagreb football club in the Croatian state. After the unsuccessful experiment with the two-headed name ("HASK-Gradjanski" as an attempt to unite traditions of two Zagreb clubs from the time before the Second World War), according to Tudjman, a beneficial formula was found: It shoudl be called "Croatia".
But, the fans have never accepted it. They demanded, more and more persistently, more and more louldly, more and more consciously - "Dinamo". They saw no reason why the name of their favourite club should change. Tudjman, however, saw no reason why he should return them the name he had once taken away from them. Convinced, as someone said, that fans go to football games just in order to dream about the state, he loudly persuaded the public that the name of the football club determines political geography and that "Dinamo" was just an overture for communism, Yugoslavia, brotherhood and unity with the Serbs. Trembling with disgust, he yelled that "Dinamo" still existed only in Pancevo. As the conflict grew, there was less and less talk about sports, and less and less talk about just a name of a football club.
The definite split occurred on the eve of the last autumn elections, when Tudjman was hissed down in Zagreb for the first time. The election campaign was frantic, and it was crowned, on the evening before the election silence, by a rally on the central Zagreb square. Annoyed by a few shouts to give "Dinamo" back to them, Tudjman lost control and, raging and foaming, tried to outshout the blue boys who defiantly shouted back. He accused them that they were enemies of the state, and his security guards allegedly acted in accordance with this judgement. Overnight, the BBBs became repulsive ruffians, manipulated rascals, mercenaries, their war merits were forgotten, the authorities applied brutality, verbal and physical.
The BBBs accepted the declaration of war. When the club in the past few days won two awards - became champion of Croatia and won the national cup - the President was welcomed at Maksimir stadium with an uproar of disapproval and abuses. Insulting shouts reached their climax during handing of the cup, and it seems that Tudjman was insulted the most because the players, instead of approaching his box as determined by protocol, hurried towards their fans to share the joy of victory with them. Apart from it, the entire stadium was adorned with banners reading "DINAMO" and placards with highly indicative texts: "Had there been freedom and democracy, it would have been Dinamo and not Croatia", "Even Pancevo has a Mayor", "Change Dejan's name, not Dinamo's" (Dejan being Tudjman's grandson whose father lives in Belgrade). "Dinamo" is becoming a symbol. A symbol of power of a single man who is so powerful, so haughty and so blinded by power that he listens only to his own will. That regardless of everything, he follows only his fixed ideas. "Dinamo" is at the same time a symbol of an increasingly articulated rebellion against such a situation in the state and the nation. A symbol of "the other Zagreb", the one which is against Tudjman.
Zdenko Mahmet, who was until recently Director of "Croatia" and who resigned in dramatic circumstances after the mentioned incidents, afraid that the club would definitely be left without its fans, says: "I begged President Tudjman to forget his vanity and save the club of complete ruin". The vanity of the head of the state has become an essential political factor and it threatens to destroy Croatia. The President of Croatia believes himself to be a man with a mission. That is why he is a measure of everything. He decides about everything and he cannot be resented anything. Everything is arranged and determined according to him. Just as he listens only to his own voice concerning "Dinamo" - he hears and listens to nothing but himself concerning other topics as well. Just as he proclaims that the BBBs are enemies just because they express different views, he qualified all those who do not share his stands, especially the opposition which is nowadays powerfully breathing down his neck, as Hitlerian putschists. He started an offensive against the media by amendments of the criminal code which safeguard his name and acts - and has already started implementing it against Feral's journalists and editors - by levying taxes and duties against Rijeka Novi list, the only independent daily in Croatia, by police actions against journalists, their arrests for questioning and similar forms of 'pacification". His zealous followers among the media have been given free hand to do what they please against the unpleasant and fearless Cicak who as the President of the Croatian Helsinki Committee refuses to be silent.
By his strike against the media, usurping the will of the voters in Zagreb, briefly, with his attempt to discipline Croatia, Tudjman provoked new postponement of membership in the Council of Europe. This time, the USA which have so far quite benevolently passed over the President's authoritarian style of rule in Croatia, have also expressed their discontent. His inflexibility sets him at variance not only with Croatia but with the world as well. People in the USA are especially appalled with his idea to redesign Jasenovac, to mix remains of those who were behind the barbed-wire fence in this death camp with those who were on the other side of it. The international public is realizing that the Croatian President is a man who does not belong to modern times. He is not only so obsessed with the past that he wishes to change it, but also advocates obsolete, anachronous ideas. All things considered, Tudjman is becoming one of the main problems of Croatia.
The number of those who are aware of it is increasing. As well as of those who have had enough. One could even say that Croatia is nowadays sharply divided, that a polarization is taking place in it, maybe even that it is heading towards confrontation. There are opinions that that is exactly what Tudjman needs, that he is provoking the conflict on purpose. It would be a pretext for him to proclaim a state of emergency and ensure several more years of ruling in which he would complete what he has started. One of his cooperates has recently said that in the next five years they would not give up power. At any cost. If they do not succeed in seizing complete power over Croatia, the solution seems to be in Tiananmen.
JELENA LOVRIC