A Merry Game With High Stakes

Somebody extremely angry or with brains limited by a blinding combination of obstinacy and rage, is even in the first days of the new 1997, still issuing order upon order which is giving that civil mutiny new and new momentum.

Such a mind as that has conceived that it is good to display force even when its demonstration presents an obvious disgrace and shame and so on. On Christmas Day thousands of policemen were brought to Belgrade in order to prevent the fiftieth protest walk and to "secure an unhindered flow of traffic". Naturally, the leaders of the coalition Zajedno following a short meeting at the Republic Square set off of on January 7, 1997 around 7:30 p.m. toward a police cordon situated at the corner of Kolarceva and Terazije in order to wish the policemen a Merry Christmas. Vuk Draskovic, using a PA system, repeated more to the police than his supporters that such an event had never been witnessed, not even when the Turks were ruling over Serbia and that neither the sultan nor the Belgrade pasha, nor any other foreigner who had ruled over Serbia had dared to forbid the people to go to church on Christmas, yet such a thing has happened on Christmas 1997. Following that, Draskovic asked for his supporters free passage towards Knez Mihajlova (he even spoke out a single "I order"). That easy Christmas game of nerves was luckily concluded with a "With God's peace, Christ has been born..." "He truly has been born", answered the police back with relief, holding batons behind their backs in probably sweaty hands.

While assessing the effects of this game of nerves certain diplomats feel that Milosevic would shortly have to use force, since he will no longer be able to stand the shame. According to a news item from Reuters, Djindjic has information that the government could forbid all public rallies on January 12, while the opposition could opt for a blockade of the entire territory of Serbia for the Serbian New Year.

The students have announced that on January 9 they shall stand their ground in front of the police and will not withdraw until it is shown who can endure longest. The head of the university Velickovic has dispatched orders to re-commence making up for lost classes and to take down all slogans from the university school walls. Since that could be a sign of further strain and taking into account the so-far exhibited proneness of the police to beat the people when they remain in small groups, Belgrade citizens shall be extremely sensitive to the manner in which the police will treat the students in the stand-off in midst of the winter frosts. If someone is still planning to terminate that laughter with tears he should keep in mind that so far laughter has been replacing anger which is mounting because this regime owes certain explanations amongst others for the brutal force employed so far.

The last echelons of Milosevic's associates from the "happening of the people" might remember what effect the unnecessary use of force in Zuta Greda in the vicinity of Niksic brought about in the autumn of 1988. All in all, the regime has already produced far greater troubles for tomorrow than the government top officials assume with their demonstration of force and false and contradictory propaganda.

In the first days of 1997 it appeared that someone was still toying with the state of emergency scenario. On Christmas Eve in front of the Yugoslav United Left (JUL) headquarters in Djure Djakovica street in Belgrade, while hundreds of thousands of citizens were gathering in Belgrade's central downtown area, an explosion occurred which caused damage to the facade and windows of JUL's headquarters, yet no one was hurt. The Alliance of Communists - Movement for Yugoslavia (SK-PJ) accused the members of the coalition Zajedno for that explosion, which was followed by a letter which JUL dispatched to foreign embassies calling the world to protect democracy from the terrorists. From the speakers platform at the Republic Square Vesna Pesic compared this case to the burning down of the Reichstag. That it could be credible that the explosion was actually a provocation of the regime supporters is supported by the obvious fact that the opposition, which is leading an imposing Ghandi-like action, has no motives whatsoever to bring shame upon themselves with some kind of bombing affair. The fact that the scene of crime was accessible exclusively to the state-television RTS crew, speaks that the pyrotechnics action most likely had primarily intentions of propaganda. At the beginning of the protest there were two other "bombing cases", which were excessively used by the regime propaganda.

The state propaganda, that is its electronic department, is unhindered for now. But it is highly clumsy. By openly ignoring reality, it is continuing to pour venom into the heads of their subscribers.

Since the Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC) has twice, in the form of an announcement of the Synod of the SPC and the Patriarch's Christmas message, placed itself on the side of the rebellious people, hundreds of thousands of people in Belgrade have conquered in the evening of January 6 every inch of the plateau in front of the Saint Sava Church for a political manifestation combined with religious festivities of the public burning of the badnjak (Serbian Christmas tree) brought for that occasion from the Hilandar monastery. It was a night filled with the smell of burning candles and liturgical sounds, but also with the sounds of Belgrade's small-scale rebellious whistles. There were new variations of the "street lights game" - large groups headed from the Saint Sava plateau via the street towards Terazije would stop, grumbling during the red lights, then moving merrily forward with the green lights. On Christmas Eve in the Church of Ascension the less politically charged true believers quietly lit their candles, placing them down for the dead and up for health in these muddled times. State television the next evening feebly remarked that Vracar was the site of the "central city Christmas celebrations", which was the first indirect acknowledgment as to who actually holds power in Belgrade following November 17. Some of those slips possibly even contain certain news on the movement of the silken thread. One Politika daily commentary points out for example that in Marjanovic's government ministers are displaying a conflict of interests. The Vecernje Novosti daily commentary reprimanded the Ministry of Justice over the shame and "tardiness of justice" concerning the Nis election committee.

Twice in the course of the week a few hundred thousand citizens in merry processions stepped out into the streets of Belgrade, and tens and tens of thousands in all the larger cities - that is a political fact which the power-holders in Serbia, whether they like it or not, have to see.

Four days following New Year's Eve, on Sunday, January 5, the demonstrators turn to their wheels in the action "blockade against blockade". On Sunday thousands of cars stopped from Autokomanda to Terazije, in Beogradska, Bulevar, Takovska and Makedonska in something between a rally, party and picnic which in comparison makes the American Graffiti film an elementary school play. Heard were sirens, whistles, loudspeakers and merry simulations of a traffic collapse.

When the overjoyed cars dispersed, the police once again takes up its position around Knez Mihajlova and to turn it into an "as I demand" situation, stops the students in their evening walk. There were even pathetic actions - an attempt to collect a fine for the unauthorized use of a siren or a police chase of some kids with whistles.

On Wednesday, January 8, the opposition made the phone numbers of the state television RTS and government bodies public and called on the citizens to "block the mischief-doers" by constantly ringing them. Seeing that the regime has no answer for their actions, that same day the supporters of the coalition Zajedno continued with their car protest and headed for a blockade of the entire area from Kalemegdan until Slavija. Already by 2:30 p.m. the first cars were stopped on Terazije. An older man in a peasant cap is examining his beat up Yugo with a stethoscope. The police, who had already slowed traffic down with their rows of busses, formed cordons closing off the passage between hotels Moskva and Balkan and towards Nikola Pasic Square in order to cut off Srpskih Vladara street. Walkers everywhere took to the sidewalks and chaos appeared in sandwich form, a row of police, a row of walkers with the occasional car trapped among them. From the London all the way to the Atina restaurant and the Presidency of Serbia building. In front of the Federal Parliament of Yugoslavia a tow-car stood whose driver was dozing rather lethargically. Accompanied by the proverbial: "No more games!" at the London the police managed to meet with certain success by opening up traffic along the street of Velikog Milosa. Following that, Draskovic had on a number of occasions called upon the rest of Belgrade citizens to get into their cars and start their protest drive along the streets which were open for traffic, yet in the ring surrounding the nucleus of the downtown streets, traffic was functioning. The mass of demonstrators headed for Slavija to meet up with the cordons at Terazije, however, following Draskovic's short speech against the "terrorist organization JUL" in which he politically addressed the police, mentioned the shady dealings of the son of the Serbian leader and the electoral theft, the automobile-platform turned back towards the Republic Square, although the police, as it seems, was expecting that the policemen be called to lay down their arms.

While the political spectacle is pulsating in full swing all are awaiting the moment when a certain man could sit down, down a scotch, remember that he used to be a banker and closing his eyes, un-ideologically pay up what is demanded, a couple of empty-headed individuals, half the television and a dozen civil rights... What could we do? At that moment we would have to hang up our whistles. Whether the leaders of the opposition shall during the approaching negotiations with the regime display as much creativity as the citizens of Serbia have in the course of the last fifty days in the street's political plays depends what the face of Serbia shall look like.