Better, Bare Life

These days, yet another unifying idea has cropped up among the Serbian opposition.  The Democrats, GSS and maybe someone else are offering a kind of forging together of reform forces to Djukanovic’s DPS and the parties close to it, with Zoran Djindjic being the foremost proponent of this.  I do not doubt the good will of this intention, but somehow I cannot believe in its success, and not only because of the proven capacity for political alliances to disintegrate in Serbia.

I think that the problem lies in that there are great differences in platforms, of which no one is yet aware.  Neither the politicians in Serbia, nor the ones in Montenegro.  The issue is not whether Djindjic and Vesna Pesic want something different from what Djukanovic wants, but rather that the situation in the two republics is considerably different.  That is why in Montenegro, a reformist coalition with the name ?For a Better Life” is being created.  A similar coalition in Serbia could, with reason and in good conscience, leave out the adjective Better”.

Djukanovic can promise a better life, while the Serbian opposition is forced to lower its offer to mere life.  In Montenegro, they’ve gotten as far as arguments about the quality of life, while in Serbia, it has still not been decided whether life is better than no life at all.  Moreover, the position of the parties of death has never better than it is now: they have never been in a formal coalition before now, and never, as now, have they openly offered a program of national destruction.  Therefore, an opposition alliance here could easily call itself ?Survival”, following the example of television programs dealing with threatened species.

Of course, Djukanovic is right when he says that he will make no effort in proving brotherly solidarity with the Serbian people through the collective suicide being offered by the Yugoslav President.”  But this means that the time for any kind of unified action between the Montenegrin Government and the Serbian opposition is fast running out.  And not because Djukanovic is in a hurry.  In reality he is merely playing well and bravely a game whose rules were set by Milosevic, who is also dictating the tempo of disintegration for FR Yugoslavia.

Therefore, it is not worthwhile setting high hopes on Djukanovic reversing the course and rescuing our joint state, not even with the most unified opposition in Serbia.  In the same way, it is not likely that Milosevic, Seselj and Bulatovic can weed out the idea of a better life which has taken root in Montenegro, except with the use of great force which they, in reality, do not have at their disposal.  Finally, the hardest imaginable alternative is the third one: that everything remains as it is, that what is the government in Serbia remains the opposition in Montenegro, and that both these blocks find a formula of parallel survival and non-aggression.

Of all the principal actors, Milosevic is the hardest pressed and I believe that he is truly in a hurry to get rid of Djukanovic.  He is probably realizing that this pestilence of a better life, which he has managed to suppress in Serbia thus far, is dangerously infiltrating from the south, while he can always count on the Fifth Estate in the capitol.  Every recent move he has made has been directed at blocking this same reformism which has already once taken him to war.

He himself complicated the question of Kosovo, transformed it into an acute crisis and exposed himself to sanctions.  He did not have to accept Seselj, and only Seselj, into the Government.  Finally, he would not need a referendum if he wanted and was able to slow down and to quiet the game, that is to say, if he did not know that any normalization is merely in the favor of people like Djukanovic.  But how politically vulnerable and inferior Milosevic is can best be seen from how threatened he feels by Djukanovic who controls merely five percent of their shared dwelling.  I think that Milosevic is thanking God that Montenegro is not slightly bigger.

Therefore, a very long time before the Serbian opposition came upon the idea of calling on Montenegrins for help, the regime in Belgrade had taken steps to make this impracticable and senseless.  In Serbia the main political theme is becoming once again bare survival, with liberal, democrats and reformists appearing quite superfluous under such conditions.  I fear that Djukanovic cannot help Djindjic and Vesna Pesic anymore than Milosevic can help Bulatovic.  It is more difficult to help Serbia than it is to ruin Montenegro.  Namely, in Serbia things have to be fixed, which is always more difficult than what Milosevic usually does.

However, if by the end of May a ?better life” were to win out decisively in Montenegro, many things would also get better in Serbia.  Maybe the opposition would not get wind in its sails, but the left-right coalition would have to take a better look around and decide where it was going.  Namely, if they became convinced that Djukanovic was here to stay and that nothing could be done against him, one important reason for the recent flaring of patriotism in Serbia would fall off.  Thus, this could also be good news for Kosovo.  Real negotiations could begin, even with a call to international mediators for help.  This means that Milosevic would have to neglect the previously expressed will of the people in the referendum, which would give him no small amount of satisfaction.

Finally, such a possible development of events could improve the situation as far as sanctions are concerned.  Milosevic needs them the most because of Djukanovic, and if Montenegro weasels out, then he will no longer have sufficient reason to subject Serbia to them.  But, all this holds true only if in Serbia things have not gone too far on the question of Kosovo and relations with the world.  Namely, it is possible that Seselj can no longer be stopped, that Kosovo can no longer be pacified, and that the world will never again accept Milosevic.