Booing and spiting

Amidst the multitude of charges regarding scandal at the World Association for the Protection and Prosperity of Yugoslav Soccer addressed recently  in the head of Yugoslav Football Association’s (FSJ) speech, state media emphasized only one—not singing the anthem. “Everyone who stands beneath the state flag must sing the national anthem. If they don’t, then they can’t play for the team. I don’t blame the players, rather FSJ personnel who don’t have the authority to make them sing the anthem,” the words of Parliament Association President Velibora were emphasized in the headlines of regime media.

If we recall, the Yugoslav team remained silent while they played the anthem Hej Sloveni; but, Savo Milosevic joked with his nearest colleagues. The exception was Coach Slobodan Santrac, who sang with discipline before every game and Dragan Stojkovic Piksi who hummed a little at first, but then fell silent when Red Star fans cursed him in the media because of it. Sport sociologists explained in the daily papers that an athlete not singing the anthem doesn’t mean that he doesn’t respect the state, there’s no need to blame them, but that even sports can’t be immune to social conflicts. Therefore, the players didn’t sing the anthem, but they didn’t disdain it. In Belgrade at least the soccer public explained itself long ago—at team games held in the capital during the last few years the anthem was accompanied by nothing less than loud booing like that in Zagreb during the 1990 Yugoslav-Holland match. Brought to despair, producers at RTS had to turn down the volume or carry it. Teams games begin with a delay, all Crevena Red Star (Red Star) fans and a large part of Partizan fans boo the anthem—hence a significant minority of the majority of the home soccer public.

ROLL OVER BEETHOVEN: “I consider the anthem Hej Sloveni like a Serbian funeral march because the state whose symbol it was brought the most misfortune to the Serbian nation in their time,” decided Jovan Surbanovic, spokesperson for Red Star fans. “This unserbian anthem, Yugoslav flag, and anything Yugoslav in general are the reflection of one dying ideology. Teams of the so-called Yugoslavia can represent only the ruling structure and ideology, but in no way the Serbian and Montenegrin nation. In harmony with our slogan ‘Red Star, Serbia, never Yugoslavia,’ we won’t root for a national team until there is a Serbian team, in other words Serbia and Montenegro. Yugoslavia and its symbols had meaning only while it was a union of six republics. Now everyone has their own state and symbols while we hold on to the continuity of Yugoslavia and with it all the morbidity to boot. Our federation, composed of Serbia and Montenegro, calls itself by some third name that no longer has any meaning. Both republic’s have the same flag (red, blue, white) but the federal state has some third one (blue, white, red). The Serbian people have always had their own anthem (Boze Pravde), now some communist concoction (Hej Sloveni) is imposed upon us...”

At the beginning of 1996, when Vreme wrote about the anthem booing phenomenon, Srecko Mihailovic, researcher at the Institute of Social Study, commented that a lot of that began here in the stadiums:  booing the anthem, burning the flag, rooting for the guest team rather than your own...(according to many theories, the war began with fights in auditoriums from which senseless soldiers were later recruited for the “national matter:). “It’s difficult to explain the current behavior of the sports public who regularly boo the anthem, even though the background here is visibly political. It’s got a little of everything—disagreement with the anthem, type of state structure, concept of the state, conditions in which we live...There’s a little bit of everything in it, probably even the reflection of some other classifications in society. For example, that of those who are  for ‘partisans’ or ‘cetniks’—the former are united Hej Sloveni in spite of everything, while the latter would gladly hear Boze pravde,” said Srecko Mihailovic two and a half years ago. The situation to date remains unchanged.

Verses for the “communist anthem” Hej Sloveni were written in a mix of the Czech and Slovak languages in 1834 by a young student of theology and history, an ardent pan-Slavist and later famous Slovak writer Samuel Samo Tomasik. Hej Sloveni is sung in the last three lines. It’s actually a variation of a Polish poem Poland still isn’t destroyed from 1787 which later became the Polish anthem. Tomasik’s song enjoyed unbelievable popularity. It was quickly translated into almost all Slavic languages including Serbian. It officially became folklorish, but unofficially the anthem of all Slavs. During the Second World War, the Yugoslav Communists, for lack of a better solution, temporarily imposed it as the anthem of socialist Yugoslavia. SFRY, however, persistently held contests for a new anthem (most likely due to the confusion at Yugoslav-Polish games) practically until its own death. Anthems were written by Mosa Pijade, Cedomir Minderovic, and Mira Aleckovic. Melodies were sought from a massive number of composers. They even tried with Beethoven--they forgot scandals concerning plagiarism... The anthem Hej Sloveni, however, survived not only the old state, but also outlived it. It was proclaimed the state anthem of FRY per the “Zabljak” constitution of 1992, probably influenced by the actual regime’s dream of a continuity that no one recognized. For these same reasons, the Yugoslav blue-white-red troika was maintained even though both federal units have their own flags with the same arrangement of color: red, blue, white. Yet the five-pointed star had to be thrown out with the “garbage of history” due to public pressure, like the completely senseless coat of arms with six torches. In 1993, a commission of the federal government was formed with a mission to propose a new coat of arms to the Federal Parliament.

When the issue is the symbols of the new state, the chaos is complete. “Serbia still has a coat of arms, derived from the Stalinist concept of the territorial coat-of-arms in the USSR, with obligatory wreaths and red star on the top and a central motif that must illustrate the triumph of an ideology over the truth, the world, and reality,” says Dragoljub Acovic. “We have an anthem, but we don’t know which one is the anthem. We have a flag with a five-pointed star, but it was accepted by tacit consent to nevertheless remove the star even though I suspect this ‘summer party’ (JUL) is only waiting for the opportunity to return us to the old one.”

Under great public pressure and a small numbered opposition in the People’s Parliament, Zelenovic’s government formed a commission in 1993 which had to suggest state symbols. ”Working by the logic that new symbols aren’t needed in a new state, the commission suggested almost unanimously (except for Milovoj Pavlovic) the kingdom of Serbia’s coat-of-arms from 1882, luckily the herald-like and aesthetically irreproachable idea of Stojan Novakovic who merged in a simple herald like symbols two historically Serbian coats-of-arms: the cross with the four C’s (cirillic S) traditionally accepted as the coat of arms of the Serbian people and the two headed eagle that is understood in history as the symbol of the Serbian state. The commission proposed this coat-of-arms in FLU professor Cedomir Vasic’s graphic interpretation. We didn’t get into whether or not there would be a crown and purple robe (red mantle) above the coat of arms. The dilemma concerning the anthem was greater, but in the end everyone, with the exception of the above mentioned dissenting vote, was for the anthem Boze pravde.”

Konstantin Babic, people’s representative SPO, who from the first convocation of the People’s Parliament (he left the party long ago), remains remembered by the public for his pledge to Boze pravde, commented on the anthem for Vreme, “The Slovene Davorin Jenko, at the same time author of the Slovenes’ national anthem, composed the anthem Boze pravde; Jovan Djordevic, dramatist from Belgrade’s National Theater, wrote the text. It was presented for the first time in 1872 at Djordjevic’s performance of Marko’s sabre.  It became a hit, and people sang it. Ten years later, approximately the declaration of the Kingdom of Serbia, it became the Serbian state anthem—only the word prince was replaced by king. Regardless of the fact that it had been the anthem of the Obrenovic dynasty, the Karadjordjevic’s accepted it with less changes. When the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, later Yugoslavia, was created, Boze pravde went into a communal three part anthem consisting of the Croatian Our beautiful home (composed by the Serb Josif Runjanin) and Forward the flags of glory. I campaigned for and entered Parliament in order to fight for that anthem. A few composers arranged it for us, they threw out the words ‘Serbian king’ and suggested ‘our country’, but in vain. It’s interesting that 90 percent of the representatives were for the anthem, but all of a sudden some order arrived—Bata Zivojinovic passed me in the hall and said, ‘You know what, nothing will come of your anthem.’ That’s how it was. My impression was that it was clean capriciousness.”

THE LABORATORY OF LAW: For those who have forgotten, Mr. Acovic recalls what occurred then, “The ruling party, whose reasons are a logical mystery,  finished the charade. Only before the coming out of the parliament, the government disowned it’s own commission and brought forth an alternative proposal for the coat-of-arms: only the shield with the four C’s around a thin, invisible cross that looks like two threads! They called it ‘the coat-of arms of King Vlastimir’ even though he didn’t have a coat of arms in his time, nor did anyone else—the first coat-of-arms appeared much later! Due to the fact that the government’s proposal aroused laughter, the government changed its proposal during the lunch break. The coat-of-arms was once again without the eagle, the cross on the shield was once again normal this time, but a gold border was put around the shield which in heraldry designates the ‘child’ of some ‘older’ coat-of-arms. For example, King Petar Karadjordjevic carried a coat-of-arms without a border, Prince Pavle with. Because there wasn’t even an  agreement concerning the symbol, the ruling party’s alternative for the anthem was March on the Drina. The law laboratory of Ratko Markovic stepped onto the stage, who on the spot launched a new institution: pre-referendum. That is, an urgent expression of citizens on the republican referendum as officially announced. Citizens should first chose one of the two proposals; then the proposal that received the majority of votes would go to the Parliament which would then announce the referendum...In short, citizens chose between two coats-of arms, of which one was held in the other, so it’s only normal that the pre-referendum failed like the coming out for the anthem. Later, in a conversation with the media, Ratko Markovic practically acknowledged that the government would have certainly accepted the commissions proposal had they not originated with the opposition!”

“Otherwise, if we’re talking about relations toward state symbols, one thing is clear: relations toward symbols is carried out with respect, even veneration, where the state and the nation are respected,” continued Vreme’s source. “Where that doesn’t exist, it doesn’t matter whether they play Hej Sloveni or Rain, please fall, the anthem of Botswana. It’s disgraceful that people here respect the German mark or the American dollar more than any national symbol. The anthem Hej Sloveni, which is no longer considered a patriotic song but an anthem imported by the communists and demonstrates that they are still in power, is a good example. That’s why I boo it.”

Nor does Montenegro, in which there was no agreement about the flag and coat-of-arms since 1905, have an anthem—liberals suggested in their time Oj svijetla majska zoro, the People’s Party Onamo namo, authored by King Nikola Petrovic, but then the united DPS decided not agitate and left the status quo. In Republic Srpska, they adopted the Serbian troika and the anthem Boze pravde, but Novakovic’s coat-of -arms was changed—in place of two crowns, there is only one above the two-headed eagle, while the two lilies in it’s claws have vanished—the lily is a medieval symbol that often appears in Serbian heraldry, but tied to the Virgin Mary. (“Throw out Alija’s lilies”).

So the fans are the guiltiest because they boo.