PROBLEMS WITH "GASTARBEITERS" (GUEST WORKERS)
Voting in Berlin
AIM Banja Luka, September 7, 1996
Adina is quite resolute: "I boycotted the first national elections in 1991, and I will do the same now, because I don't wish to return to Bosnia which is divided, nor do I want to be identified according to national affiliation".
Adina is one of 30 thousand refugees who are living temporarily in Berlin, out of the 350 thousand in whole of Germany. While she resolutely explains her stance, other visitors of the South-Eastern Centre in Berlin, which is primarily the meeting place of Bosnian refugees, smile at her "internationalism".
The forthcoming elections scheduled for September 14, agitated the citizens of Bosnia & Herzegovina who are living in the capital of Germany. Apart from the issue of participation in the elections - the possibility of voting in writing existed - the refugees are concerned about the announced return to Bosnia.
The return which was supposed to begin on October 1, and then was postponed, has nothing to do with the elections. But discussions about the quickest possible return of the greatest possible number of Bosnian refugees regularly dictates front page titles in German newspapers and screens the elections.
"Majority will choose national parties", says Ismail (47), a refugee, supporter of the Sarajevo Associated List and associate of the Centre. "They all intend to choose their own, in order to prevent the other nation to win. Nobody expects the existing situation in Bosnia to change, so that return for many means uncertainty, and is premature", explains Islmail.
Mentioning of the elections among members of the "Serb-Bosnian" community in Berlin - they are mostly people who have lived for decades in Germany - causes discontent and nervousness.
Miloje Milicevic, President of the Serb-German club "Vuk Karadzic - Brothers Grimm", in a desperate tone says: "The Serbs have no possibility to vote by mail". The complaint refers to OSCE Coordinating Office in Bonn which organizes elections by mail in Germany, for the entire territory of Bosnia & Herzegovina. As a basis for approval of voting by mail, the OSCE takes the 1991 census and documents issued before March 31, 1991, which testify about residence in the former Yugoslav republic, they explain in the Office.
"Just a few days before the the deadline for registration in the end of July, OSCE Office started to announce elections by mail in Serb media", says Milicevic. Seven hundred registration forms which the President had sent "at the last minute" in two packages to the address of the Bonn Office - "remained unanswered".
Milicevic is convinced that the application forms ended up in a wate-paper basket.
Jens Grimm, spokesman of OSCE Office eliminates the possibility of manipulation. "We work in two large offices, we are ethnically mixed, Muslims, Germans, Americans, it is imposible to nullify the registration forms".
But for the question about Bosnian Serb "gastarbeiters", the exact number of whom nobody knows because they used to be registered as Yugoslavs, and who are mostly not on census lists from 1991, there seems to be no answer. Grimm admits "that the problem of 'gastarbeiters' is not recognized by anyone" and that, pursuant the Dayton accords, the Office is in charge of enabling only refugees from Bosnia & Herzegovina to vote.
About 130 thousand of citizens of Bosnia & Herzegovina have been registered for the elections. Dusan Kovacevic (47) is not a refugee, he has lived in Berlin for 26 years. His application did not end up in a waste-paper basket. He and his wife were born in Teslic, they have a house and a shop there, and they wished to vote. They were both refused by letters in which they were told that they were not on the census list from 1991 and that was the reason why they had not the right to vote.
"In 1991, I received an invitation for the elections at my address in Teslic, and now they are writing to me that I am not on the list", says Kovacevic and shows copies of documents which he sent to Bonn.
In any case, Kovacevic did not use the right to appeal with the mentioned document issued before 1991. He believes that this was an intentional act against the Serbs and that there was no point in lodging an appeal. "To those with whom I am supposed to lodge an appeal, I have already documented that I was from Bosnia", he says.
The refused Serbs are now getting ready to go to their native places and vote. Bitterness that quite a few "Serb votes will be lost" remains, however, says Kovacevic, because all those who wish to vote cannot go.
(AIM) Ljiljana Nikolic x x