Negotiations or a Trap?

AIM Zagreb, 29 November, 1998

Is Franjo Tudjman finally giving in to the opposition, or is he, on the contrary, pulling it into a trap of feigned negotiations in order to disperse it and perhaps even destroy it on the eve of decisive parliamentary elections in a year's time? This question is in the air ever since a few weeks ago the Croatian head of the state informed the Austrian foreign minister Schussel that he was ready for an agreement with the opposition in order to overcome the parliamentary crisis.

The crisis broke out when six greatest opposition parties, headed by the Social Democratic Party (SDP) - which since the past summer operate as an informal coalition - decided to resign to all duties in the Assembly, except those of deputies, as a mark of protest because the Croat Democratic Community (HDZ) practically prevented assembly discussion about secret services. The immediate cause was public accusation made by Hrvoje Sarinic and Franjo Greguric, until recently Tudjman's close associates, that Ivic Pasalic and the faction of radical nationalists were trying for some time to compromise and politically destroy them and other members of the "liberal" faction by means of secret services and yellow press controlled by them.

Tudjman ordered investigation which was carried out by superior security services and bodies of the assembly, but it was evidently done so superficially and with such political prejudice that it was clear in advance that it would yield no results. That is the reason why Sarinic withdrew from the party and all state and party posts, and Greguric acted in a similar way, having kept only his party membership card. Hurt by having been forced to break up with Tudjman whom he served with unlimited resoluteness ever since 1990, especilly Sarinic insisted on clarification of the espionage scandal. That is how by his mediation, new elements of this scandal have been revealed - primarily massive tapping of phones and spying on journalists of a few independent weeklies, but also those which are linked to the secret services.

Obviously dumbfounded by everything that has come up to the surface in the struggle among the factions in the HDZ - which the public has known existed but, being as usually uninformed, could not have suspected that it had acquired the proportions of an internal war - the opposition reacted in the only possible way it could. It created a critical distance towards both the warring factions, insisting at the same time that the scandal be clarified in an acceptable manner - by a new discussion in the assembly in front of cameras of Croatian Television. At first the HDZ refused and even scorned it, claiming that the weakly opposition was just imagining that it could cause a parliamentary crisis. At the same time, it was said that minor extreme rightist parties, which have only two or three deputies each in the assembly, would fill in the gaps caused by resignations of the six opposition parties.

But, since not even they were ready to openly play the role of assembly puppets, it became clear that by its arrogant disregarding the facts, the HDZ was actually assisting the opposition in its silent blockade of the parliament at the worst possible time of the discussion about the budget for next year. In such a situation, Tudjman "used" Schussel to declare his readiness for negotiations, although on any other occasion he would have certainly avoided stating such an important piece of news via a foreign medium. Now, however, this seemed convenient for him in order to create the impression that he was ready for a compromise for the sake of sublime state interests, and not in order to give in to the opposition (whose demands, as always, are endlessly getting on his nerves).

In order to reinforce this position of the authority who is above any party's interests and who has only the benefit of the state and the nation at his heart, he did yet another thing. He left Vladimir Seks, head of the HDZ parliamentary group, to make arrangements about the negotiations, who at a few secret meetings, agreed with Ivica Racan, president of the SDP, that the negotiations should be on two topics. These are the secret services and amendment of the election law, which is the first sign of good will of the HDZ to meet some demands of the opposition. This primarily refers to establishing of multiparty electoral control and the share of the majority and proportional election model in the new election law, while the HDZ will not give in so easily when abolishment of separate election lists of candidates for diaspora (which a priori bring HDZ ten per cent of the seats in the chamber of representatives of the assembly).

Leaving Seks to negotiate about negotiations, Tudjman kept for himself the right to supervise from the position of the arbitre what he and Racan are doing and intervene if necessary. The initial demand of the HDZ was that, along with the six, "other opposition parties" participate in the negotiations (meaning the mentioned rightist satellites of HDZ), and when after Racan's insisting Seks gave up on it, Tudjman interfered and brought things back at the beginning. All things considered, he similarly acts when speaking of other open questions. The opposition insists that Tudjman take off his mandarin's armour of the alleged super-party arbitre and participate in the negotiations in the capacity of the head of the HDZ (and only if the negotiations succeed he could appear as the head of the state).

It seems that Seks was again ready to accept the stand of the opposition, just as he was in favour of a compromise concerning who the initiator of negotiations had been, which is important to make it clear who needs a compromise more (Seks and Racan found a Solomon's explanation that "two initiatives have met"). But, at this point Tudjman interfered again and annulled the efforts of both negotiators. Having returned from the official visit to Greece, he pretendedly expressed curiosity whether the opposition had "required" negotiations in his absence. And then an official statement was issued from his office in which is was stated that the "president of the Republic" had accepted the proposal of Vladimir Seks on the beginning of negotiations between HDZ and the parliamentary opposition parties.

It is obvious that Tudjman is not entering negotiations with the intention to achieve anything serious by them, but he is just buying time needed for the scandal with secret services to die down so it will not affect the disposition of the public in the forthcoming months when preparations for elections will begin. It is also highly probable that with the feigned negotiations he is trying to weaken and compromise the opposition - among which there are already differences in the approach to negotiations - and probably those in his own party who in the negotiations with the opposition see a chance for themselves to win a better starting position before the elections. Seks himself recently surprised the public with the declaration that, if it were not ready for changes, the HDZ could lose the elections. But at the same time he announced, obviously trying to please the vanity of the stern and capricious head of the state, a "constructive showdown with the opposition" by the end of the year.

That such a showdown should really be expected is confirmed by the experience with previous negotiations, conducted in the past years between the HDZ and the opposition. There were two, in 1994 after the Manolic-Mesic "coup", and two years later, when at the time united Croatian Social Liberal Party of Budisa and Gotovac presented a proposal to the HDZ of fundamental political, ecoomic and moral reconstruction in the state and the society. In both cases, Tudjman manifested exceptionally big interest for negotiations, but in fact did everythinbg in his power to make them drag on and in the end prove a failure, seeking in them an opportunity to humiliate and disunite the negotiators of the opposition.

This showed that Tudjman and his party sometimes intentionally accepted a defensive position, but only as a smoke screen after which a counterattack followed, which was as a rule successful. Obviously the same intention exists now, and the only question is whether after his illness and serious disturbances in his party, Tudjman has enough cunning and insolence as before.

MARINKO CULIC