ARE WE READY FOR PEACE?

Chances for Civic Bosnia

AIM Sarajevo, July 11, 1996

Democracy is a sacred concept of every modern society. Everything that has happened to us gives us all the more reason to at least believe that we have won the right to such an ideal. This right is an important, decisive step towards the ultimate democratic ideal - freedoms and rights of any man, individual, which will make him responsible for the life which belongs to him. What kind of a society can and need develop in the space and wasteland of the planetary tragedy which has happened to us, here in Bosnia?

Before we could come back to normal after the shock we had experienced, we were faced with another challenge: were we ready for peace? The fact that this peace has been imposed on us by cynical will of those who could have prevented our tragedy, does not diminish the possibilities offered to us through it. One of the greatest is certainly the possibility and the right to decide on our own what we wish for the future. "It will not be easy, it will not be simple". This is apparently the utterly simplified message we have been listening to every day from one of the pre-election slogans of USAID which suggests that peace is our future. Well, does anyone know it better than we do that it is correct? The only problem is that our present peace is just the interruption of the war. Establishment of real peace in Bosnia will take a long time and it will, quite certainly be a very painful and complex process.

The world dealt with Bosnia almost completely counter-productively, even when there could have been no doubt about good intentions. One of the very rare and certainly one of the best meaning mediators who has absolutely and to the end understood the very essence of the cause of our tragedy, former Polish prime minister and former special rapporteur of the UN for human rights, Tadeucz Mazowiecki, participating at the session of the Fourth General Assembly of Helsinki Parliament of Citizens in Tuzla (October 19 to 22, 1995), underlined the fundamental problem of Bosnian future almost as a prophet. "If the political solution in B&H implies division", he said, "a civic society can overcome the division. But, even if the political solution does not imply division, Bosnia & Herzegovina will not be capable of overcoming the division, if the civic society is weak and fragmented. That is why it is of utmost importance that the international community offers support to civic society within the program of reconstruction of B&H".

Is civic B&H utopia or possible reality? The answer to that question can be given by the Dayton Accords and the forthcoming elections. If it is true, and indeed it is, that real peace can be established only in an integral B&H, than it is even more true that it will by no means depend on the signed accords and artificial peace, but on the future role of civic society. And whether such a society will ever exist in B&H depends solely on the will of its citizens. In other words, it depends on what they will choose in the forthcoming elections. Regardless of increasingly complicated and numerous external influential factors, the fundamental problem is internal resistance which in the entire B&H political scene (both in the Republika Srpska and the Federation) permanently generates a profound political crisis. The resistance is based on irreconcilable nationalistic concepts of ultra-rightist political oligarchies, whose slogan "one nation, one religion, one party, one leader" can efficiently be opposed only by the concept of democratic civic society. That this is true and that they are aware that this concept is the greatest danger for them is best seen from the fact that in their finespoken pre-election political rhetoric they insist on it that they are the ones who have set their hearts on the civic model of society and that they are the only ones who can accomplish it.

The idea of civic society in B&H is permanently and persistently, but in view of the absence of even a minimum of political power, nevertheless not efficiently enough, advocated by certain independent civic groups such as, for instance, the Citizens' Forum from Tuzla and Circle 99 from Sarajevo. Aware of the necessity of general interpersonal reconciliation as a precondition of new joint life in this land (without which there has never been Bosnia, nor ever will be) members of these groups advocated and spread the idea of a civic society in B&H as a precondition for democracy, efficient protection of human rights and freedoms and equality of citizens regardless of the their national or religious affiliation. In circumstances of deep frustration because of the tragic events, it is of an utmost importance to develop a network of civic initiatives in the whole territory of B&H, in order to establish a democratic alternative to national policy of the currently ruling parties. A civic initiative founded on free communication among people, which is still imbued with inconfidence and hatred, and on dialogue as a civilized way of public promotion of ideas is necessary as a process in reconstruction of the society, because it ensures initiative and political will of the individual, free of pathological collective national and religious unaniminity.

There is no doubt that most subtle details of this idea are present in many people in B&H, but they must be delicately and patiently liberated from the chains of the existing frustrations. A significant project under the title Civic Alternative Parliament initiated by the Citizens' Forum from Tuzla and Circle 99 from Sarajevo which will soon promote it along with several civic associations from Banja Luka, Zenica, Livno, Mostar, Breza, Bihac and Doboj, will quite certainly be a very significant investment into democracy greatly supported by eminent international institutions which are ready to assist this initiative. Indeed, the fact which is most encouraging is that this initiative will soon be joined by similar groups of citizens from Trebinje, Bijeljina, Gorazde, Prijedor and other cities, which is also the best sign of gradual recovery from the experienced misfortune and of re-establishment of trust and need for a joint life.

Civic Alternative Parliament wishes to "infect" with its ideas ordinary, normal people and inspire them to take initiative and participate in this project. Common interest is to make, at least for the beginning, civic B&H little less a utopia and little more reality.

SLAVKO SANTIC