Reformists' Double Face

DIVIDE ET IMPERA

AIM Podgorica, 29 March, 1998

As it was expected the President of the Republic, Milo Djukanovic, called extraordinary parliamentary elections for May 31, heralding an eventful spring in Montenegro. During the next sixty days a no-quarter struggle will be waged for 78 deputy seats in the Republican Parliament. Before that, multi-party working groups, true with much friction, have harmonized electoral rules in accordance with the agreement reached this autumn between the majority of opposition parties and the Montenegrin Government.

However, behind the curtain of electoral rules and terms, inside Montenegro, an unscrupulous struggle is being waged in which no one pays much attention to laws and other legal regulations recently adopted by the Republican Parliament. The objective of all parliamentary parties is in the first place to gain control over the electoral rolls. Head of the Computer Centre of the Government of Montenegro, Branimir Gvozdenovic, announced that the electoral rolls will be completed for the May elections and that there will be no reason for complaints. However, situation on the ground gives much reason to doubt that the registering of voters has really been completed. Quite contrary, during the last two months parties have been waging a true war in order to win control over local authorities. The elections to date have shown that communal authorities can have significant influence on the final electoral outcome: they are in charge of appointing vote-counting committees, electoral boards, they control the local media, etc.

The intensity of this struggle for the communal supremacy is best seen in the fact that Montenegro has twenty-one commune, but twenty-three "legally" elected Lord Mayors! Although in late January the two wings of once united DPS signed a "non-aggression pact" none of them abides by the signed agreement.

Being in absolute control of the republican state institutions, the DPS of Milica Pejanovic-Djurisic was the first to decide on a show-down on the local level. Consequently, in the capital city of Podgorica and the third largest town of Montenegro - Bijelo Polje, the "reformists", supported by the National Party, the SDP and parties of the Albanians and Moslems in Montenegro, managed to appoint new Lord Mayors. A similar strategy was, more or less successfully, applied in other Montenegrin communes. In those in which the DPS representatives have "won", the police ensured their taking over of power. Obviously, wherever conditions exited, the DPS simply "forgot" the last year's Agreement and stories about the democratization of elections and with might and main strove to create one-party (i.e. its own) communal vote-counting committees, as happened in Budva and Cetinje.

In all this they did not pay much heed to the legality. At the recent session of the Assembly of Montenegro, representatives of the Liberal Alliance strongly criticized the replacement of Lord Mayors and especially the behaviour of the police. Ranko Djonovic, the LSCG President, stated that secret police "worked on" members of his party, delegates to the Municipal Assembly of Podgorica, so as to secure enough votes for the appointment of new Lord Mayor. The Liberals also strongly accused their until-yesterday's partners from the coalition "National Unity" - Kilibarda's Populists - for getting out of the coalition Agreement and falsifying the LSCG seal in Podgorica in order to do DPS's dirty work.

As it was expected, representatives of the Bulatovic's renamed Socialist National Party (SNP) were harshest in accusing the DPS for illegal replacements in Podgorica and Bijelo Polje. They claim that the State Security Service is completely in the service of one policy

• that of Djukanovic's and Marovic's party. "Instead of doing its job, the police has joined the electoral campaign. It is wooing delegates for the illegal replacement of presidents of municipal assemblies. It gets on main boards of parliamentary parties by bribing and intimidating those who are against the so called reformist police line", said Bulatovic's party in its communication.

Slavko Perovic, political leader of the Liberal Alliance, also thinks that the proclaimed equality of parties is being violated in the election campaign. In an open letter addressed to Filip Vujanovic, Montenegrin Prime Minister, Perovic asked for the OSCE representatives to come immediately so as to preclude any objections as to the regularity of May elections. The leader of the Liberals warned of "the readiness of some structures within the Democratic Party of Socialists to treat these elections in the well-known way" and mentioned that "contrary to the spirit and letter of the Law on the Election of Delegates and Deputies one-party or supra-party commissions without representatives of the Liberal Alliance have been formed in Budva, Cetinje, Zabljak, Mojkovac, Danilovgrad and Bijelo Polje". Perovic also claimed that the police "was lobbying for a specific political group" and mentioned that state and local media were "put in the service of creating a prestigious image of the current authorities".

Until now the Montenegrin Prime Minister did not bother to answer Perovic's open letter. The Prime Minister is evidently preoccupied with electoral activities. During this week alone he will visit Berane, Andrijevica, Plav and Rozaje and no doubt, in his capacity as Prime Minister, contribute to the strengthening of the positions of his party. That the election campaign is in full swing is also evident from the work of TV Montenegro which every day intensively follows rallies held in communes or local communities at which state officials appear representing the ruling party. Reports from these meetings are given in the first minutes on the News while information on, e.g. foundation congress of Bulatovic's SNP was broadcast in the slot dedicated to party activities which is on only after Eleven O'Clock News.

No doubt, with the approaching parliamentary elections all means will be used in mutual party accusations in the coming two months. According to the research carried out so far, Djukanovic's DPS and Bulatovic's SNP stand an excellent chance of winning at the extraordinary parliamentary elections. The first pre-election activities also show that these two parties have the greatest number of followers.

However, the question is whether Montenegro will be strictly divided into two blocs, as was the case with the previous presidential elections. It is evident that one-time allies, signatories of the "Agreement on Democratic Montenegro" find it hard to agree on anything. One of the reasons are the apparent endeavours of the DPS to gain as much strength as possible on its own and even possibly restore the earlier one-party monopoly.

Similar situation is with the Bulatovic's SNP. Financially and informationally aided from Belgrade, the SNP has already established a developed network for logistic support on the ground. Namely, in his capacity as Federal Defence Minister, in only twenty days Pavle Bulatovic got rid of all (Djukanovic's) chiefs of district defence bodies in Montenegrin communes, and replaced them with members of his party. Thus, Branko Bujic, a member of the SNP Municipal Board, was appointed chief in Bar, Dragan Braunovic, also a high SNP official, in Podgorica, etc. Similar things happened in Zabljak, Kotor, Plav, Rozaje. In this way Bulatovic's party managed to create a solid infrastructure and now has communal premises, powerful communication facilities, special phones, as well as service cars at its disposal for party needs. At the recent promotion of his party near Podgorica, the SNP President announced that his party activists will "go underground", that the party will organize "training seminars for members" in order to prevent the election rigging.

The SNP sympathizers are surely aided and abetted by the behaviour of the competitive DPS which is trying to win the majority in future parliament on its own, stopping at nothing and gaining an increasing number of political opponents in that process. Guided by narrow party interests and eager to win the greatest possible share of the power cake, the DPS has so far disregarded offers for coalition. However, the times of a powerful and united DPS are distant past now and it is becoming evident that the Democratic Party of Socialists has neither political strength nor will to share the power which, according to foreign observers, would be a precondition for a true democratization of Montenegro. By the time the DPS realizes that it might be too late for reforms in Montenegro.

Drasko DjURANOVIC

(AIM Podgorica)