On 15 March, Belgrade saw its largest funeral procession since the death of Marshal Tito in 1980, as hundreds of thousands marched behind the funeral cortege of the Serbian prime minister Zoran Djindjic, slain by a sniper's bullet on 12 March.
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Although Djindjic's policies - particularly his programme of economic privatisation - were highly unpopular, the number of mourners reflect ordinary Serbs' apprehension at the prospect of yet more political instability, and their deep revulsion at the power of organised crime, allegedly responsible for the assassination.
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Since Djindjic is credited with leading the huge street protests that ousted Miloševic on 5 October 2000, the world's media have taken the opportunity to compare the regimes of the two leaders. Many have noted how many enemies Djindjic notched up in his political career, particularly invoking the spectres of organised crime and nationalism.
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Romano Prodi, chief commissioner of the European Union (EU), warned that the reform process in Serbia was under 'attack from violent anti-democratic and anti-liberal forces', while NATO secretary general George Robertson said that: 'This tragedy demonstrates that anti-democratic forces and extremism are still active in Serbia.' (1) Spain's El Mundo was particularly lurid, claiming that 'the totalitarian hydra has many heads' (2). Vague commentary of this sort can be readily asserted without any support, largely because the lingering depravity of 'the Serbs' is still taken for granted by much of the world.
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Consider the 'nationalism' that allegedly underlies the broad popular opposition to Djindjic's policy of cooperation with the International War Crimes Tribunal. Former Yugoslav president Vojislav Koštunica is Serbia's foremost nationalist politician, and Djindjic's foremost political opponent. Although Koštunica has consistently won the majority of votes in elections, he has nonetheless lost two consecutive presidential elections, both annulled due to low voter turnout (3). Despondency and political apathy are not characteristic of people in the grip of nationalist zeal.
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Anti-Western feeling has undoubtedly lost its vigour and indignation over the years, having been blunted by Serbia's international isolation and economic misery. But criticism of Western policies still remains popular, largely because they are perceived as being hypocritical and unfair, provoking particular outrage for being pursued in the name of 'international justice'. Prodi's and Robertson's vague remarks on the opposition that Djindjic (and through him, Western regional policy) faced, evoke the long path of penance that Serbia must still trudge before it is deemed morally fit to re-enter the European comity of nation states.
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The spectre of organised crime is a case of Djindjic, and indeed the West, reaping where they sowed. To be sure, Djindjic inherited a onerous legacy from the Miloševic era: on the one hand, an impoverished economy reduced to small-scale peasant agriculture and black marketeering, with a mafia-style oligarchy dominating what remained of lucrative state monopolies. On the other hand, Miloševic's power was entrenched by political patronage, graft and private armies of paramilitaries enmeshed in smuggling rackets.
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But this criminalised state and economy is a consequence of two things: firstly, the brutal international sanctions regime that forced the Serbian economy to plug into the international black market to survive the 1990s; and second, the fiction of Djindjic's 'democratic revolution' that ousted Miloševic.
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The massive street protests that preceded Miloševic's overthrow were largely a stage army. Rather, it was the 'tumbling pigeons' that ejected Miloševic - key senior officers and security officials who switched allegiance from him to Djindjic's coalition, thereby earning the mocking comparison with a breed of pigeon that performs acrobatics in mid-flight. Acutely aware of his own unpopularity, Djindjic preferred backroom power-broking with Miloševic's generals, rather than allow the popular street protests to take their course. Hence, 'Serbian October' had neither distinguishing hallmark of a political revolution: a collapse of state power or of the ruling elite (4).
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One such tumbling pigeon was Miloševic's ex-henchman and mafia kingpin Milorad 'Legija' Lukovic, whose 'Red Beret' paramilitaries stormed Miloševic's villa and arrested him on Djindjic's orders in June 2001 (in direct violation of the Constitutional Court and without the authority of then President Koštunica). Now arrest warrants have been issued for Lukovic and his gang, on suspicion of ordering Djindjic's assassination.
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Djindjic was consistently unable to shake off allegations of links to organised crime. The BBC's Gabriel Partos even suggests that Lukovic's gang was angered 'that they were being bypassed and that [rival groups] were being favoured' (5). It seems that Serbia is paying the price for Djindjic's peaceful putsch of 5 October. Lukovic has called in the regime's debt to the mafia and paramilitaries with Djindjic's blood.
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Less constrained by the language of funereal diplomacy, obituaries in the British press blithely discuss - without even a hint of irony - the political similarities between Djindjic and Miloševic. The Independent observes that 'Djindjic's approach to politics was most similar to that of Miloševic, his great adversary' (6), referring to their shared preference for opportunistic intrigue and managerialism over democratic process.
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Indeed, Djindjic deployed political patronage as skilfully as any apparatchik: after expelling Koštunica's deputies from his governing coalition, Djindjic simply filled their seats with loyal allies and supporters. The Daily Telegraph notes that Djindjic's and Miloševic's shared authoritarianism earned Djindjic the nickname of 'Little Slobo' (7), while the Guardian recalls how Djindjic once publicly roasted an ox with the former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadžic (8).
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Which all leads to the question: what precisely was the difference then, between Djindjic and Miloševic? The answer is clear in the unquestioned assumption underlying so much Western commentary: that Djindjic's political project is fundamentally incontestable, regardless of whether Djindjic's leadership is democratic, and regardless of what the Serbian populace think of him.
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In short, the key difference between Djindjic and Miloševic is that Djindjic followed Western diktat, while Miloševic did not (or at least not as consistently as Djindjic). And, for the Western elites, it this that ultimately constitutes the difference between a prison cell in The Hague and a ministerial suite in Belgrade.
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Read on:
Serbian Octobers, by Philip Cunliffe
(1) See Djindjic Killing Condemned, 12 March 2003, BBC News
(2) See European Press Review, 13 March 2003 BBC News
(3) See Serbia Election Drama Heads into Farce, Alix Kroeger, 14 October 2002, BBC News; and Serbian Octobers, by Philip Cunliffe
(4) See Serbian Octobers, by Philip Cunliffe
(5) Who Killed Djindjic, Gabriel Partos, 13 March 2003 BBC News
(6) Zoran Djindjic: Pragmatic Prime Minister of Serbia, Gabriel Partos, Independent 13 March 2003
(7) Zoran Djindjic, Daily Telegraph, 13 March 2003
(8) Serbian PM Shot Dead, Mark Tran, Guardian Unlimited, 12 March 2003
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