IN NO WAY CAN THE CROATIAN ELECTIONS BE FAIR

Zagreb Mar 22, 1997

AIM Zagreb, 16 March, 1997

The Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) will do anything to remain in power - said its President Dr.Franjo Tudjman at the celebration of the seventh anniversary of the first party congress. That February 24, at the same time marked the official beginning of the election campaign for the District Chamber of Parliament and for district, communal and municipal assemblies, and the main decision was: Dr. Tudjman shall be the frontman on all HDZ lists in all districts, communes and cities. This is not in contravention of the law because Croatia is perhaps the only country in the world in which someone can be at the same time holder of lists in all districts and all (around 450) cities and communes, and even run for office in the assembly, as it was the case last year when Dr.Tudjman was elected councilman in Zagreb. It is truly tragicomic for a state president to run for the office of municipal councillor, although it was perfectly clear that in this game he was nothing else but a "rabbit" who would give his place to someone else.

On several occasions the opposition tried in vain to change this nonsensical part of the law in Parliament and clearly stated its suspicions as to the fairness of the the elections. Up till now, the HDZ leadership had two or three times rejected such accusations, since no one, as they said, could have any suspicions in advance and, at the same time, be unable to prove that there had been thefts. But, is it really so and are fair and honest elections at all possible in Croatia. The answer is explicit and firm: NO! And for two reasons.

In the first place, a whole series of tricks is built-in into the legal electoral engineering. In addition to the already mentioned right for one man to be a holder of all electoral lists, HDZ constantly refuses to accept amendments to the law according to which the electoral committees would be multiparty and not, as was the case till now, composed of people who do not belong to any party. If the HDZ wants to disperse all doubts it is unclear why doesn't it agree to these demands of the opposition, since it is known that the first multiparty elections in 1990, which are generally thought to be the only fair elections ever held, were organized with such multiparty committees? Also the HDZ does not agree with a request for electoral boards those at the state level as well as those at the level of districts, communes and cities to be multiparty, but only allows one HDZ representative and one opposition representative to sit on them. The control is possible only through observers, and one doesn't have to be very imaginative to realize what is the method of selecting 43,000 persons, who are not members of any party, who will sit at more than seven thousand polling places.

Moreover, on the basis of its majority in Parliament, HDZ has the right to "gerrymander" electoral units to its liking, i.e. to adjust them to the distribution of its sympathisers so that it is not surprising that some communes have a very strange form, or for one street to belong to one and its other half to another electoral unit. True enough, this year the electorate will not vote for the Parliamentary Chamber of Representatives, but the decision not to hold the second electoral round, i.e. that a candidate with the greatest number of votes will be considered elected, even if only some 20 percent are in question, since the other votes will be scattered, will have its repercussions on the elections for communal, city or district assemblies.

Strange is also the method of elections for the District Chamber, because the formula of the proportionate system is applied, but with only three candidates lists, which in practice becomes a majority system, so that in theory it is possible to have a majority with only 35 percent of electorate. And that is where pilfering of thousand or perhaps only some hundred votes can help as they miraculously become invalid, are lost or are, on the other hand, added. Until now it was proven that the greatest number of invalid ballots appeared at polling stations where there were no observers, and the easiest thing to do was to circle two names or ordinal numbers instead of one. The increased number of invalid slips, which at the last elections almost doubled in comparison to 1992 (2.21 percent), can be interpreted by the fact that the Croats have all of a sudden become dumb. Therefore, opposition representative on the State Electoral Board, the liberal Vladimir Primorac, proposed that voters should use a ballpoint pen and members of electoral committees lead pencils.

Furthermore, electoral laws envisage that only parties which exceed the limit of 5 percent can get a councilman or a committeeman, and when coalitions of e.g. two parties are in question, that limit is eight percent, of three parties as much as 11 percent, etc. which means that a large number of votes are thrown away which, according to d'Hondt formula, are added to those strongest, which in the case of Croatia for the time being is HDZ.

This time, the so called diaspora - which at the last elections with its 12 representatives made the HDZ majority in the Parliament stronger - will not vote, but it is not a bad idea to mention this unique concoction which is one of a kind in the world. Namely, that "diaspora" actually consists of Croats from B&H, or better said Herzeg-Bosnia, who, accidentaly, are in no way diaspora because they represent a constitutive nation in the neighbouring country, and it is also questionable how someone who doesn't pay taxes in a state can decide on its fate? And when it comes to the District Chamber, according to the Constitution, the President of the Republic has the right to appoint his five members - just in case.

Until now there was no explicit or concrete evidence of the mishandling of ballots, but interesting were observations of Josip Manolic, whom many consider the main HDZ artisan for hanky panky, who said that as much as 10 percent of votes can be stolen without anyone noticing it. Naturally, he said that at the time when he and Mesic broke loose from Tudjman and formed the Independent Democrats. There was also a testimony of a lady from Osijek, a former HDZ member, who claimed that everybody stole shamelessly en masse. Recorded was also the case of a small party which according to electoral commission's report lost not in percentages, but in numbers. This made many wonder was this the so called computer virus, i.e. a programme which deprived some parties of votes adding them to others, or perhaps the programme was no good so that it meddled in the results of even those whose votes did not increase. In any case it remained a secret to this very day how did it happen that the Croatian Party of Right was below the line until the last but one report, and all of a sudden crossed the electoral threshold with 5,1 percent.

The then president of the State Electoral Board, now former president of the Supreme Court, Dr.Krunislav Olujic, behind the scenes spread the story that he knew full well what it was all about, but that he was helpless. Two Zagreb cases cause most suspicions. In the electoral unit Dugo Selo the opposition candidate had for a long time the lead, true by a narrow margin, and after the repeated voting in two electoral units, the HDZ candidate won. Similar thing happened when the then Mayor Branko Miksa had already publicly congratulated his opponent, the liberal Ivo Skrabalo, on his victory, when all of a sudden everything changed and some hundred votes appeared in his favour. Dubrovnik was somewhat a different story. There, the Foreign Minister Mate Granic was a "rabbit", but the first reports showed that he would loose elections to the opposition candidate. In the end he won convincingly. The well-versed claimed that the secret was in the departed souls, as well as in those who crossed over in large numbers from the neighbouring Herzeg-Bosnia and became Croatian citizens.

The dishonesty of these elections, but again according to the law, also lies in the information that each district elects three delegates, irrespective of the number of inhabitants. Thus, over 720 thousand electors in Zagreb, or 360 thousand in the District of Split-Dalmatia, 260 thousand in the Rijeka-Coastal District, 256 thousand in the Osijek-Baranja District elect the same number of delegates as, for example, 47 thousand voters in the Lika-Senj District.

In addition, it is hard to explain the expansion of the electorate in Croatia with each elections. According to the official 1992 data it increased by 56,212 votes by 1995. However, if the official version is accepted that this can be accounted for by refugees with permanent residence who have become nationals of Croatia, the question remains what happened with the killed and missing persons, and what with the exiled Serbs? And another thing about which no one took account in fixing the results. Namely, according to the official report, the total number of voters in 1995 was 3,631,248 but, if the number of voters registered in electoral stations is added, which can also be found in that same report, we come to an amazing data: 3,719,396 citizens were registered on the electoral rolls. There is an enormous difference of over 88,000 voters. No one of the officials in charge came up with any answer, except for Krunislav Olujic who at a press conference jokingly (or rather, harshly) stated that people obtained citizenship and residence papers in a hurry. But, this is undoubtedly a key evidence that something is wrong with the elections.

And that the opposition did not raise dust without reason is evidenced by the case with the HDZ dissident Tomislav Mercep who, dissatisfied with his status in the party, which gradually discarded radicals, counteracted by posting his own independent list in the Osijek-Baranja and Vukovar-Srijem Districts. However, the HDZ questioned the legality of these lists, but the Constitutional Court had a different opinion. Nonetheless, the state board did not abide by the Court's ruling and annulled his lists. Mercep appealed again and the Constitutional Court again ruled in his favour. Now, it is again the turn of the the state electoral board. In this way Tudjman clearly showed that he meant business when he stated that he would do anything to remain in power.

GOJKO MARINKOVIC