The Country With no Future

"Already three years ago, in one meeting at the Institute for Physics whose topic was science, I drew up the chart after the discussion. My estimate was that we will, under the condition that the sanctions were lifted then, in 1994, reach the level we were at in 1985 only in 2015! Some weeks later, the Institute of Economics gave the estimate, based on some 12 parameters I believe, that it will be in 2012. More than two years passed from then and I would now freely move my estimate to the distant year of 2020. After that, younger associates chased me through the halls asking if I seriously meant that. And my estimate was utterly sincere. If one was to finance the sciences, everything else must function: this means economy has to be restored to its previous state, and everything destroyed and lost must be restored too. When this happens in our land, I will definitely not deal with science any more. I will be perhaps alive, but an old man, or perhaps I will be already dead...", says academician Milan Kurepa.

An enormous number of young people with diplomas, masters and doctors of science, go abroad. Some of them will surely not return. What is your recommendation to them?

"For almost 5 to 6 years I am in the position not to recruit new, young associates. We choose the best, giving them absolutely nothing in return. I have nothing to offer but sweat and tears: the equipment is obsolete with no chances to be renewed, wages are catastrophic, so low that if I, who is about to retire cannot live on it then how can than a novice!? They have no chance to obtain a roof over their heads."

Is there the future for this country without its intellectual elite? What will this country be like without them?

"The way it is already. Look at everything that is happening around us. A mind is not usually wanted, but suitability is. The best and the newest example is that Marjanovic has accepted the visit by only one part of Belgrade's University Council, only the representatives of the government in the Council, and the other part -the representatives of the University- are not welcome for the Prime Minister even when the discussion is about the catastrophic state of the University. This is the obvious proof of the government's opinion. You ask what will happen to this country? The country which forces its best people to exile has no future."

The Ministry of Education is preparing yet another political storm- it is officially announcing the drastic decrease in the number of students, professors, even the closure of some schools...

"That's nonsense! As long as the executive positions are occupied, just take a look around. They are semi-educated, quasi-educated, illiterate, semi-literate and it is ridiculous even to speak about the surplus of experts in this country. It's absurd! Even the argument that their education is expensive does not hold since they are leaving. They are leaving because of the environment, and not because they are not needed. We need many, many educated people. There are talks about the surplus of teachers in the schools, and on the other hand, we have semi-literate teachers teaching in schools. There is surplus of doctors and look at what happens when one gets sick!? The point is not that we don't need all those educated people, we need at least ten times more experts. The problem is different - the political will that something radically changes in the society, that the priority is given to knowledge, and not to suitability and obedience."