Popular Agreement

The National Party (NS) and Liberal Party (LSCG) will stand in next November’s Montenegrin parliamentary elections on a single election list under the name Popular Agreement. They reached agreement on that but we still don’t know if any other party will join them. The Social Democrat Party (SDP) had an August 19 deadline to decide but instead they sent a letter saying their main board will meet on August 24 and give the proposal due attention. It’s also uncertain whether the Democratic Alliance of Albanians (DSA) and Moslem Democratic Action Party (SDA) will join the coalition but NS leader Novak Kilibarda and LSCG leader Slavko Perovic say they are still open to all democratic parties.

Kilibarda and Perovic promoted their coalition on August 22 after an agreement which says that "the rule of the DPS has brought Montenegro and its citizens into an intolerable social, economic and political position, that undemocratic changes in the election law are aimed at preventing the establishing of a free and democratic society. We feel that the fight for democracy is above individual and party interests and that we are under obligation of the sovereign and free will of the citizens, retaining fully our political particularities and goals, freezing all big issues on which our two parties differ, the NS and LSCG have reached an agreement with the goal of winning the majority in parliament and creating conditions for democratic elections in Montenegro."

The two parties also agreed to adopt a proportional system election law with one electoral district. They also agreed to open the state media, set up parliamentary control of the police, establish an independent judiciary, fight crime and illegal wealth, stop the robbery of state property and establish responsibility for the transfer of hard currency abroad.

The agreement says those goals will be developed in the election program and implemented with no political revenge in mind. It adds that agreement was also reached on new elections being called as soon as those goals are met, in two years at the latest. The two parties said they would share seats in parliament under 1992 election proportions and added that the principle would be used in forming a government.

Kilibarda and Perovic said there were no difficulties in drafting and accepting the agreement. "We reached agreement easily," Kilibarda said, "because we put aside all difference to settle them in the democratic conditions we will secure if we win the elections." Perovic was categorical: "Montenegro is coming out of the trenches because this coalition wants to end the divisions that have torn us apart for centuries. We want to turn to a prosperous future, solve all problems as the modern democratic world does."

The government they want to set up would have open doors in political establishments and banks across the world, Kilibarda added. The coalition expected the SDP to be part of it and wants the DSA and SDA to supplement it as well.

We still don’t know who will join the coalition. SDA leader Zarko Rakcevic told VREME that his party is ready to join a coalition of equal opposition parties to change the authorities. DSA leader Mehmed Barli supports the coalition but says there were no specific talks on defining party interests. "We are discussing it and we talked to the SDP about local elections," he said.

Narun Hadzic, SDA leader, said his party hasn’t decided yet and added that views differed.

Rakcevic said the SDP wants a lot of things defined, starting from the names on the election lists to the people in the government. He said the SDP can’t allow itself to disappear from the scene because of relations with coalition partners.

The fact is that everything boils down to the number of seats in parliament and the fact that the SDP is in no hurry to respond to the proposal. There has also been some criticism that the NS and LSCG could have waited for the SDP decision and that the SDP is talking to other parties about a coalition, primarily the DSA and SDA.