Serbian and Croat Voters Count

Local and regional government elections throughout Croatia began on Sunday, April 13, at 7:00 a.m. In those regions where voters voted for candidates from Croatian political parties everything went more or less smoothly, so that election booths closed at 8:00 p.m. We are talking about 97% of the territory of the Republic in which the active legal and constitutional system is accepted. In the remaining three percent of the territory, where the unspeakable is yet to be put in place after the elections, and where in that spirit Serbs and Croats are being counted one ballot at a time, very few things did go smoothly. For this reason the ballots did not close for two full days. Otherwise, that part of Croatia — Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srem — which is under transitional UN control, represents the remnant of the former Republika Srpska in Krajina.

The UN supervised elections — for which Croatia made all necessary preparations two months ago, but to which the Eastern Slavonian leaders alerted their Serb population only 48 hours before the set date — began in utter confusion. Very few of the 170 ballot booths were opened on time, few were up and running by noon, and some were not open by the end of the day. Yet all booths were surrounded by people carrying necessary Croatian i.d.’s, but no voting was taking place. At some booths, the Election Committee members were not listed, and at others, whole streets were left out of the voters lists. Voting ballots intended for one location were delivered in another.

Because of all this, on Sunday afternoon the much expected elections were threatening to completely fall apart. That would certainly postpone a peaceful reintegration of that region in Croatia, spur on the local Serbs to flee the region, reawaken the crisis in Serb-Croat relations, and cause the UN and its election supervisors to completely loose credibility. In order to salvage the elections, the Chief of the Transitional Administration, Jacques-Paul Klein, in consultations with Croatian authorities, permitted all citizens carrying relevant documents to vote, regardless of whether their names appeared on the voters lists or not. For the same reasons, the elections were extended to Monday in some places, and to Tuesday 2:00 p.m. in Klis.

The reasons behind this administrative nightmare will be discussed for some time, and each interested observer will have a different opinion. Serbian leaders will claim that Croatian authorities were trying to withhold voting rights from many Serbs in the hope of avoiding Serb majorities in communities throughout the region. Zagreb, for its part, will claim that Serbs were trying to create maximum confusion in the hope of avoiding reintegration, and showing that Croatia is not a democratic republic, thus managing to strong-arm their way to independence. Finally, UN will claim that under such conditions there was not much anybody could do to insure that the elections are organized the way they should be. It seems no one will be far from the truth.

UN spokesman Filip Arnold states that he is not in possession of any hard facts. In other words, the voter turnout is left to approximation. Arnold approximates that 60 to 70 thousand Serbs came out in Eastern Slavonia. The ballots of Croatian refugees from the region (68,000 of who were registered and had voted in 640 different locations throughout Croatia) were not delivered to the UN at the time this article was going into print, even though they were supposed to be delivered by April 14. The ballot count, once all the ballots are available, will be conducted by a mixed committee of Serbian, Croatian and UN Transitional Administration representatives. Until that is accomplished, UN soldier will stand guard.

It is considered that the ballot count itself should not present a significant problem. Serbs clearly voted for Serbian candidates, Croats, for Croatian candidates, and the only task is to properly measure voter turnout. The estimates are, when the region is considered as a whole, that Serbs are in the lead by several thousand votes or several percentage points. Dr. Vojislav Stanimirovic, the President of the Independent Serbian Democratic Party (SDSS), which was the only Serbian party in the elections, expects victory in ten to eleven communities; but the fight for Vukovar, which is considered paramount, will be very close in his estimate. He thinks that it will come down to a 14 to 12 differences in representatives, either way.

Even though all observers are aware of the significant flaws and deficiencies in the organization of the elections, the international community will in all likelihood declare the elections regular. The basic requirements were met: according to Stanimirovic’s estimates, 85% of the Serbian eligible voters came out, acknowledging by this action the legal and constitutional system in force in the Republic of Croatia.

What will happen in the region after the elections is difficult to say. One thing is certain: the new local authorities will not be able to function without the cooperation of Serbs and Croats, which will in large part depend on relations between Belgrade and Zagreb.