Here Comes the Left

"So far we’ve focused on the tool, that is the coalition, more than on how we’ll use the tool and win. From now on we’ll only deal with winning and we’ll all fell better than we did over the past five or six days," Democratic Party (DS) leader Zoran Djindjic said after signing an agreement on conditions for the Serbian Democratic Party (DSS) leader to join the Zajedno opposition coalition. The agreement was signed by Dragoslav Avramovic after Djindjic (Vuk Draskovic and Vesna Pesic signed earlier) and the Zajedno coalition finally became fully operational after a number of problems and mutual accusations just 24 hours prior to the deadline for submitting of candidate ballots.

Despite the lateness there was enough time for a last look at the ballots and for the party leaders to get into final arguments. In any case, Djindjic, who invested the greatest effort into getting the coalition to go along with Avramovic, should be believed when he says everyone will feel better now. Unlike Avramovic who faced the hard job of shaping up the opposition coalition, leftist (JUL, SPS, New Democracy) coalition leader Slobodan Milosevic seems to have had an easy job. VREME sources said Milosevic was given the election ballots of all three parties on October 1 and had the indisputable right to change them in any way he wanted to. That does not exclude the possibility of letting his wife and coalition partner Mira Markovic take a look at the ballots to polish them up. JUL and New Democracy (ND) said they aren’t as greedy as the Zajedno parties.

Informed sources in the SPS said the ND politely asked for five federal parliament seats (all they need to set up a parliament group) and added that they might even get six. Informed sources close to the Zajedno coalition doubt that and claim ND leaders offered their party to Avramovic as a coalition partner. Avramovic consulted the other coalition leaders and always met with their fierce opposition. Sources stated that the fact that ND has joined the leftist coalition is reward enough for the party because it flirted with both coalitions.

While assessments were being made prior to Avramovic’s agreement to join Zajedno, the SPS did not believe the left (SPS, JUL, ND and Montenegrin Democratic Party of Socialists) could win a stable majority (between 65 and 70% of the 132 seats in the chamber of citizens). VREME sources said the SPS was then prepared to give JUL and the ND a total of 20 seats with JUL getting 15. After Avramovic joined Zajedno that calculation seems frail and that means a deal between the leftists could become a much harder job than first thought. An SPS official confirmed that Avramovic upset the balance: "Every opinion poll showed that with the expected abstention of voters we could win if we brought out just our party members. Now, Avramovic will probably convince most of the people who are disappointed with the opposition to turn out to vote. That’s the highest stake he’s bringing to the opposition."

Leftist coalition party leaders said there’s nothing strange in the fact that they decided to unite and added that negotiations have been underway for months. "If parties that have completely different programs can unite why shouldn’t we and the parties with similar programs," is the most frequent explanation. Prior to Avramovic’s decision the SPS, JUL and ND leaders frequently said they might form a post-election coalition.

These are the first elections in which the Socialists won’t be standing alone "in order to mobilize the creative powers in society". Another motive for the leftists coalition should be sought in the concentration of votes. When JUL was formed a frequent comment was that Milosevic isn’t gaining anything and that he’s just complicating things for himself. Two years later things seem to have changed and now the leftist coalition has a hand in everything that can be controlled - the media, army, police, state sector and through JUL most of the private sector. So JUL isn’t just bringing money into the coalition. It should get the votes of people who have been disappointed by the SPS, especially members of national minorities who can’t forgive the SPS for its nationalist outbursts.

Ognjen Pribicevic, an associate at the Belgrade social sciences institute, said Avramovic has pulled the entire political scene in Serbia to the left. The Zajedno coalition, which the leftists are calling a rightist coalition, includes the words farmers-workers-democratic in its name. Pribicevic told VREME that the name shows a clear intention to attract workers and civil servants, parts of the population which voted for the ruling party so far. That ambition is quite logical since opinion polls have showed for years that the political scene in Serbia is much wider left of center than right of center.

Pribicevic said polls by his institute last December showed that 26% of the polled believe socialism is the wrong system, 29% that it had some good and some bad sides, while 15% feel socialism has a future. "The same poll showed that 28% want a job with higher earnings at a risk while 58% want a safe job with lower earnings which could be interpreted as a choice between capitalism and socialism. That shows the wide range of the left and that most of the opposition is crowding into a small space, leaving the Socialists a big field to play in. The left of center space is much wider in Serbia than in most other former communist countries."

Pribicevic said the coming elections will be marked by two very interesting issues - the relationship between the SPS and JUL after the elections and can the SPS be beaten by economic issues prior to the elections. He added that the SPS could melt into JUL. On the second issue, Pribicevic said the choice of Avramovic as the Zajedno leader points towards economic issues but he feels that does not mean the inevitable fall of the leftists despite the current economic situation.

‘The roots of the ruling SPS are fairly deep and they don’t have a clue for the real situation. About 25% of the electorate votes for the regime because it sees no difference between the state and the ruling party. That is part of the authoritarian political culture and is a serious drawback for the opposition. That part of the electorate always votes for the authorities because they are the authorities and the current economic situation is not a decisive issue. If you tell them about the catastrophic economic situation they say "It would be worse without Milosevic". When you mention the war in Croatia and Bosnia they say "there was no war in Serbia thanks to him". The opposition can’t really influence that part of the population despite the fact that Milosevic’s popularity is dropping."

Just a month before the elections it still isn’t clear what the two coalitions will argue about and what the central topic of their pre-election campaigns will be. The only thing that is clear is that there are only three serious contenders on the scene: the leftist coalition, Zajedno and Seselj’s Radicals who will stand against both coalitions. Electoral system experts said the Serbian Radical Party (SRS) will face problems in winning the 10% that belongs to them since it takes up to 15% of the votes in some districts to enter parliament.

Many believe that we are now facing probably the most interesting and dirtiest campaign since December 1990. For a start, the Socialists could throw Avramovic out after claiming he is officially an SPS member.

Vuk Draskovic’s political advisor Milan Bozic wrote about the pre-election campaign in the latest issue of Srpska Rec: "You have to admit that you’ve never seen a farmers-peasants-democratic coalition led by a former socialist bank governor who spent his life in the west and who advocates capitalism and strict monetary policies but favors a party with an extreme nationalist orientation opposed to the west." Bozic forgot to say that Zajedno will face the leftist coalition whose members are "red businessmen" and the nouveau riche who are counting on the poor man’s vote.

Psychological Significance

Ognjen Pribicevic feels that an added attraction at the elections is the fact that they are primarily psychological, i.e. preparations for republic elections in Serbia next year. Even if the leftists lose convincingly, the opposition would not be allowed to form a government because that takes the approval of the Chamber of Republics (where the Socialists have a majority) and isn’t due for re-election for a year.. The opposition could prove that the number of people who vote for the authorities is dropping and that the authorities in Serbia can be changed at the polls. If everything remains as it is, Milosevic could speed up the republican elections.