1999 Peasants' Rebellion
AIM Zagreb, 1 July, 1999
In the last days of June 1999, roads in Croatia were blocked again by long winding columns like at the golden times of tourist years in the end of the seventies. But this year's crowds, contrary to the previous ones caused by raids of summer European nomads eager for the sun, the sea and vacation, are the result of peasants' protests who, discontented by the agricultural policy of the government of Zlatko Matesa, blocked the most important roads from north-east to north-west of the country. Considerably great traffic chaos was created - border crossings with Hungary, Slovenia and Bosnia & Herzegovina were blocked, even the central motorway Zagreb - Lipovac (once upon a time known as the Zagreb-Beograd motorway), so travelling from the west towards the east of the country turned into a real nightmare. Besides, the situation at the points of peasants' protests, the points of close encounter between the peasants and the police were quite electrified, and had a spark gone off, it could have turned into uncontrolled rage and bloodshed.
Croatia has never experienced such an organised and massive peasants' protests; what in the past few years was organised around Slavonia by peasants' tribune Antun Laslo resembled more a part of the local folklore than a serious protest which could shake up not only the position of the minister of agriculture but even Matesa's cabinet itself. Indeed, soon after Laslo's protest the then minister of agriculture Zlatko Dominikovic was forced to leave the post, but his departure was more the result of numerous scandals linked to his name than that of the wish of the government to pacify the peasants by removing the minister responsible for this field.
This year, everything seemed much more serious. The protests lasted for days, they were massive and well organised, their effect was evident, and the support - regardless of how hard national television and state media tried to diminish or misinterpret it - was offered from all directions. The regime is at a loss what to do: it could not meet the demands of the peasants because of the empty state cashbox; it would have been very risky to apply repressive methods of forcible removal of the road blockades because the social situation in the country is explosive even without them; to maintain the status quo was dangerous for two reasons: the peasants rebellion could expand to include the workers, and should blockades of the roads continue, it could cause great economic damage.
Demands of the peasants, who as some opposition deputies are explaining in the Croatian Assembly are in dire straits, regardless of how realistic they may be, are unacceptable for the government. Farmers asked that three, for them most important conditions be met: that the state immediately pays them the whole sum for the delivered products; that the purchase price for this year's wheat crop be 1.32 kunas per kilogram; and that the domestic farming and livestock raising be protected from excessive import.
Minister of agriculture Ivan Djurkic, obviously without any power to deal with the demands of the peasants, tried first to convince the public that the government had already paid all the money for agricultural products. Then he started explaining that the demanded purchase price of wheat was out of the question and that the most the peasants could expect was 10 to 15 per cent higher than the current price of 0.75 kunas per kilogram. Djurkic's explanation of the third demand of the peasants - which was later repeated in unison by prime minister Matesa and chairman of the assembly Vlatko Pavletic (who also received a delegation of the Croat Peasants' League, the organizer of the protest), as well as certain high officials of the Croat Democratic Community (HDZ), was the most ridiculous: Croatia could not close its borders to import of agricultural products now when it was on the point of entering the World Trade Organization (WTO)!
Ivan Kolar, president of the Croatian Peasants' Council, who is experienced by many as reincarnation of Matija Gubac, the legendary peasants' leader in the 1573 rebellion, calmly and soberly explained that replies of the government and its clerks have no sense. Obviously, on the eve of the harvest, the peasants would not have blocked the roads with their tractors had they received the money for the delivered agricultural products. Second, the purchase price for a kilogram of wheat of 0.75 kunas means a harvest at a loss which the peasants cannot afford any more. Not even high prices of production (seed, pesticides, fertlisers, insurance) and 22 per cent of value-added tax can be covered by the price offered by the government, and a profit is completely out of the question.
How unrealistic the price is offered by the government to the peasants for purchasing their wheat is illustrated by the example demonstrated a few years ago by Osjecko-Baranjski district prefect, Branimir Glavas. In order to win the favour of the peasants and make important pre-election points, without the decision of the government, on his own, he offered the price of 1.10 kunas per kilo at the time.
And finally, the peasants are not against import of food as the minister of agriculture, the prime minister and other state officials tried to explain, but just demand that this import be controlled and that the peasants in Croatia enjoy at least as much support of their state as their colleagues in the countries which most of the agricultural products are imported from.
One of the most successful mouthpieces of the peasants' interests and sharp critic of the government agricultural policy, the discharged editor of the agricultural show of Croatian Television called "Thr Fruit of the Land", Ivo Loncar, established that the import of food products into Croatia is measured by billions of US dollars. Indeed, all kinds of things are imported, mostly what Croatia is capable of producing itself. Last year, for instance, silos of Osijek industrial agricultural combine (once, even within the limits of former Yugoslavia, one of the greatest food producers), when harvest was in full swing, were ready to burst with imported Argentinian wheat. Greediness for importing commissions and profits made on the price differences completely ruined Croatian farming, because without state assistance offered in developed western agriculture, it cannot survive the competition with its prices.
Driven into a corner and scared by the proportions of the protest (100 thousand peasants with 30 thousand of their tractors, combine harvesters and ploughs), but also by the circumstances in Croatia in general - of which these ones in agriculture might be just the tip of an iceberg - Croatian regime at first decided to disqualify of the organisers of the protest by claiming that they had manipulated the peasants and that they wished to cause chaos in the country. The Croatian Peasants' Party took the brunt of the attack because the regime sees it as the main inspirer of the peasants' rebellion. The regime accused them that in the election year they wish to win over the votes of the peasants and that they are manipulating them by using all possible means. As if it would have been that simple to take content and rich peasants out into the roads just a few days before the beginning of the harvest.
The organizer of the protest, the Croatian Peasants' League, calmly declared: "We wish to make it clear to the Croatan public that the government of the Republic of Croatia has spent a few billion kunas for financial rehabilitation of plundered banks and various enterprises, and that the demands of Croatian peasants can be brought down to just charging for what they have earned, to protection of domestic production and establishment of market justified prices of peasants' products".
When obviously from the highest post a sign arrived to give in to the peasants, through its minister, the government apparently accepted the demands of the peasants. It turned out that all their demands were accepted overnight although it is not clear where the state will get the money to carry out all that. It is indicative, however, that on the same day when the peasants withdrew from the roads, the price of fuel at gas stations went up. Perhaps the state has after all found a way to resolve the problem of discontented peasants by politics and not by police. Fear of broad social disorders is too great for the regime to dare do what it had announced to the peasants: to clear the roads by police repression. The possibility of social street unrest is openly announced by foreign diplomats in Zagreb (The New York Times, 28 June). Was the peasants' rebellion just a dress rehearsal which could have set Croatia on fire is the question which will be answered by those in Croatia who are pulling the strings of politics and - the police.
DRAGO HEDL