President's Nation

On Tuesday, December 24, enough like-minded people and fans were rallied together to enable our president to hold a speech. Indulging his wish to address only those who shall not boo was paid for by the citizens of Serbia with some hundred or so broken heads. The doctors at the neuro-surgery clinic of the Emergency Center are still fighting for one life. And it is a true miracle that the price wasn't much higher.

On Tuesday Milosevic divided Serbia into two parts which hovered on the brink of war. His sympathizers were advancing towards downtown Belgrade from all sides. They arrived by trains and buses, carrying his picture and slogans which, both by their handwriting and context, plainly showed that they had been made in one workshop. Tired and bleary-eyed, they had no idea of where they had been nor when they got back to the buses to head for home.

They carried his pictures, while Belgrade citizens whistled at them, chanting out: "Cattle!", "Scoundrel!", "Sheep"... or simply: "Boo!". People from Kosovo arrived first and gathered around the monument to Earl Mihajlo. Upon the Belgrade citizens hollers of displeasure they reacted with shriveled smiles. A handful of miserable creatures! In their new and shiny peasant shoes and attire, short jackets under which the ends of their belts were protruding... They were acquainted with Belgrade which awaited them once as "brother Serbs from Kosovo". "The brother Serbs from Belgrade" threw eggs at them this time, advanced towards them and surrounded them in order to tear their slogans and posters, throwing sticks on which the banners stood at them.

"The voyage was strenuous, but when it is a question of support for Slobodan Milosevic, nothing is difficult for us", says a man from Kosovo, while he was running away from the Republika Square towards Terazije. "What else can we expect from them than something like this", he said, shivering with dismay and humiliation. These people mostly repeat that they came to help Serbia. The political program is a repetition of what is stated on the slogans: "We don't want foreign flags" and similar. This is a world in which Serbian program xenophobia from the end of the eighties and beginning of the nineties is still present. The people from Kosovo make up the largest number of them. People who have arrived by buses from the south and east of Serbia are heading towards Terazije via Bulevar Revolucije. Those from Blace had no idea of the skirmishes in the center of town, yet their steps were leaden. These are people who have arrived to support the regime, yet despite that, in most cases, they are afraid to give their names. They often make up names and express their pleasure at the deceit by shared laughter amongst their like-minded friends. It is understandable why a man from Nis refused to give his name. He says that he came out of fear that he could lose his job, that he received a day's wages of 50 dinars and some provision. What is certain is that they all had free transport, few of them had a day's wages, while provisions were handed out to many, yet not all.

"I never believed that something like this could happen. No one had warned us of a possibility of such a welcome. We received invitations, I don't know whose signature was on them, yet they arrived from the local community.", said a woman whose fellow traveler identified as Savka. Savka has not "taken sides" and doesn't know who won in Smederevo where she has just arrived from. Her fellow traveler due to some reason shows us a scar on her throat which she says is from a chetnik knife. She doesn't think that there are chetniks in Belgrade therefore showing that she wasn't duped by TV propaganda, yet when she hears that some 200.000 rally on the protests of the coalition, stunned, she lets out a: "What!?" The tour operator approaches with the suggestion - "Walk, walk, just keep walking!"

Around two, word got around that someone who had arrived under the Vrbas banner had shot a man from the Serbian Renewal Party in the head with a gun. It seemed as though the assumption was coming true that chaos was being organized in order to create an alibi for imposing a state of emergency.

The police arrived then, as gray as the day was. It took them a long time to take up their positions. Yet they didn't create a human shield around the Terazije plateau to separate the people. Skillfully, by closing up certain segments, they were chasing away the Coalition supporters, which were instinctively running away from the closed off space. The police were enclosing a space from which no one would remain who would boo at the speakers on Terazije. The town center was closed at three o' clock. Resistance towards the newcomers was weakening. Belgrade citizens were looking for each other, roaming the streets: Kosovska, Kondina, Majke Jevrosime, trying to find their procession which was to appear with the effigy of Milosevic in prison suit. The whistles and trumpets whined solitarily on the streets. The moving meeting occurred in front of the Politika building. Finally, all of Belgrade was marching together. Confetti from torn up articles were being thrown off Politika.

The other Serbia, at Terazije, was awaiting the speakers. Our engineers, being unable to construct anything else, were constructing a stage on which people worth a few million dollars could stand. They arrived, one by one, the two Dragan Tomics, Zoran Todorovic, Mirjana Markovic, Slobodan Cerovic, Krstic, Lilic, Matkovic... And then President Milosevic arrived. He was greeted frenetically, with old cries, uncreative slogans and ready-made iconography. The mass, which had timidly arrived at Terazije, was now expressing its support to the president bravely and loudly and even managed to summon up enough courage to demand Vuk's arrest. He didn't answer them. When the president stated how Serbia can not be divided, after an hour and a half, the mass of his opponents which started off from Trg Republike "unfolded".

While they were heading back towards their buses a bucket of water was thrown at them from a terrace at Bulevar Revolucije. They took out their food and ate. Gordana Simonovic from Vracenovice was holding a picture of Milosevic. She shall return it where it had stood prior to the journey. They didn't have to do anything: make banners, write out slogans, nor, god forbid, conceive them. Their only job is to appear, to lend their support and to go back. Which is what they did.