Qualifier in May

The delays in forming a new Serbian government, the unrealistic list of Vuk Draskovic’s demands over ministerial posts for his SPO in the government and increasingly frequent statements by some Montenegrin parties that elections for the FRY parliament should be organized have forced the Socialists to raise that question at last Friday’s SPS main board meeting. Milomir Minic, the man who usually knows the answer to questions like those, calmed them down about the elections. He said the Socialists are done holding elections for a long time. Why should they do Zoran Djindjic and his DS any favors just because he’s unhappy about not being anywhere.

This year, the Socialists are expecting the very important elections for the Montenegrin parliament. Belgrade won’t be glad if Milo Djukanovic’s people win those elections because that seriously undermines Slobodan Milosevic’s position as FRY president and casts serious doubts on what Minic said. The SPS will do everything to raise Momir Bulatovic and his party from the dead and help them forget their losses by May when the Montenegrin elections are due to be held. A new frontal attack can be expected on Milica Pejanovic-Djurisic’s DPS via the state media which will attack Djukanovic.

The top ranks of the SPS based their belief that there won’t be any elections soon on their conviction that the talks on forming a new government with Draskovic will succeed. The fact that he’s demanding a lot of ministerial posts (the prime minister, deputy prime minister, 10 ministerial posts, ambassadorial posts and other things) is being interpreted by the Socialists as demands to calm his party members. A VREME source claims that Draskovic was told right off that everything is negotiable but the posts of prime minister and police minister. What if the SPO does not agree with the offer and refuses to enter the government. The source said: "They’ll agree. It would be folly to refuse what’s on offer because it’s a lot."

A lot was agreed about the government over the new year holiday when Draskovic and ND leader Dusan Mihajlovic went off somewhere together.

As for Montenegro, the calm in the SPS is based on their predictions that Bulatovic’s party will surely win the parliamentary elections. The Socialists are certain that Bulatovic’s people will win between 50 and 60 seats and since power in Montenegro is concentrated in parliament, Djukanovic would become marginal. "He would be like the British queen, with a driver and bodyguard and no power," a VREME source in the SPS said. In that case, the SPS could even agree to early federal elections whose only purpose would be to politically wipe out Djukanovic.

The election victory of the reform wing in Montenegro (which the SPS isn’t even considering) would create a completely different environment at the federal level and would allow Djukanovic to send his people to the Chamber of Republics. That isn’t enough to topple the FRY government and endanger Milosevic because that would require majorities in both parliament chambers. Legal experts have indicated a different scenario: to topple the government, you only need a disagreement on which chamber would prevent any decision from being taken for six months. In that case the government has to fall and the FRY president has to call early elections. The constitution also allows the possibility of early elections if the parliaments of Serbia or Montenegro request them. The FRY president has to take that request under consideration. Milosevic would certainly not give that request serious consideration if it came from a Montenegrin parliament that was not controlled by Bulatovic.

In Montenegro, the request for early federal elections has gained a semi-official profile. Deputy Prime Minister and DPS official Miodrag Vukovic said recently that "serious reasons exist both from a legal and a political aspect" to think of holding federal elections at the same time as the Montenegrin elections. "If there is doubt in the legitimacy of the Montenegrin parliament and if an agreement has been reached on elections in May which will cause changes in the Chamber of Republics, it’s logical not to keep the existing structure of the Chamber of Citizens." If not, he said, the old political structure could stay in place in federal parliament, while the republican parliament undergoes changes.

Bulatovic’s party reacted to those demands immediately. Deputy leader Predrag Bulatovic said those demands are disputable because the authorities in Podgorica are trying to condition the republican elections on federal elections which is risky; because elections for the Chamber of Citizens have to be held simultaneously in the entire FRY which means only with the agreement of both republics; and because "the puppets of the American administration in Montenegro, headed by Djukanovic, want to try to weaken the position of the SPS and the federal bodies which enjoy the support of that party".

Montenegro National Party deputy leader Dragan Soc told VREME that the initiative for early federal elections has the support of virtually all reform and democracy minded forces in the republic. "Everyone who is truly worried about the survival of this state," he said. Soc expects the SPS to block the initiative at the federal level. "After the elections in May, things could change and if the reformists win, we can expect incomparably stronger institutional pressure for early federal elections. We could face an absurd situation that the Chamber of Citizens does not express the will of the Montenegrin electorate unlike the Chamber of Republics. As for my party, we see the early federal elections primarily as a chance to win back the seats which were illegally taken away. To us this is an opportunity to block Milosevic’s efforts to change the federal constitution without the agreement of the people of Montenegro," Soc said.

On the Serbian political scene, the story of early elections is now being pushed most by Djindjic’s DS. The Serbian Civil Alliance (GSS) holds a similar view, the Radicals have nothing against early elections. The SPO, like the SPS wouldn’t want to give Djindjic a chance to return to the political game. Vojislav Kostunica also doesn’t want early elections. He claims that Djukanovic will reach some sort of agreement with Milosevic.

The qualifiers for the early federal elections are being played till May. After that, Djukanovic and Bulatovic will play a new game, much more important than before. The SPS prediction that Bulatovic will win could be wrong. The SPS seems to be underestimating the support Djukanovic is getting from the international community and the fact that he controls the entire state apparatus. Something similar happened once before. Informed sources said that last summer prior to the presidential elections in Montenegro, SPS deputy leader Milorad Vucelic asked Milosevic: "What if Djukanovic wins". Milosevic supposedly said: "No way."

Djukanovic went on to become Montenegrin president and Vucelic went down into the party ranks.