Litigants

While the saying used to be, "I’ll see you in court", today seemingly serious politicians are suing each other left and right. The Montenegrin Supreme Court is scheduled to decide whether the true candidate of the Democratic Party is the one with or without a mustache. The situation in Repubica Srpska is slightly more serious, as there are no mustaches to serve as identifying marks of political allegiance. Their Supreme Court is scheduled to decide whether Biljana Plavsic rightfully dissolved parliament. What is interesting in both instances is that, regardless of the Supreme Courts’ decisions, each litigant stated that they will not budge one inch from their present positions. That is to say, Djukanovic and Bulatovic will continue to haggle over who has the right to that which they jointly acquired, while Plavsic and Krajisnik will continue doing what they are doing regardless of what the Supreme Court of Republica Srpska decides. Having arrived at a point where the Minister of Justice is calling the Federal Justices "his buddies" (see the statement by Miroslav Todorovic on p. 27 of this week’s VREME, Serbian version), it would be immature to expect that the courts, be they supreme or otherwise, will take it upon themselves to cool hot heads. That is to say, that they can hardly be expected to represent any forms of authority, because here courts function as instruments of pure politics, where politicians treat them much in the way that a lazy housewife treats dirty dishes: she angrily washes them, when there is no more room in the sink. Despite all that, in both cases, it is clear that the resolution to the conflict will be decided through elections. Both in Montenegro and in Republica Srpska, elections are being called for October. The litigants in each lawsuit are attempting to influence voters with decisions from their respective Supreme Courts. What they are doing now with the courts is akin to whiling the time away, much like a Balkan farmer and a good husband sues his neighbor in winter, just to make his life more interesting. Here litigants are rarely satisfied with the solemnity and authority of a court decision. They prefer the dusk and darkness, when criminal retribution is hard to observe, and witnesses are few...which is not unlike what happens in elections here.