A few days ago we read the announcement Protector of Citizens, in which this institution defends believers who were waiting in line to kiss Belt of the Virgin in the Church of St. Sava. The protector suddenly woke up and confirmed the progressive spin - believers were attacked and mortally offended by atheists and other anti-Orthodox elements. And what kind of attack is it? One sociologist hated by the authorities stated that this performative bowing is professionally called "fetishization". I guess those who thought that the term "fetish" refers exclusively to sex and sexual orgies are offended.
This introduction, however, has nothing to do with our interview. He just wants to remind how much the institution of the Protector of Citizens has failed since our interlocutor stopped leading it, and a character whose name we still don't remember took over. And who calmly observes the violence that the government has been perpetrating on citizens for many years, and that is increasingly intense.
All those who cooperated with the old Protector of Citizens (2007-2017), an institution founded by Saša Janković and his associates, could realize that a serious independent regulatory body can be born in our country, which controls the government and protects citizens. After leading this institution for ten years, our interlocutor ventured into political waters, in which he did not stay for too long. He was the opponent of Aleksandar Vučić in the 2017 presidential elections and won almost 600.000 votes in a perfectly unequal battle. Later he founded the Movement of Free Citizens and was its first president. However, he very quickly withdrew from the political river, and today he is an international consultant for human rights and control in the security sector.
"WEATHER" In an interview, you stated that Serbia is in deep trouble, "essential crisis", which is clearly readable in all areas, from politics, through the economy to security. It really seems like everything is falling apart right before our eyes, that all institutions, to say the least, dysfunctional and tragicomic. What is actually happening right now, which are shallow and which are deeper reasons for this metastasis?
SASA JANKOVIĆ: Bad government that lasts for a long time. But not only that. Any authoritarian system rewards unquestioning loyalty over expertise, obedience over responsibility, and the interest of the ruling group becomes more important than the public interest. After a while, the consequences are no longer just political - they become institutional, economic, security and even moral. Today's acts of government do not only change the present but also the future. And we have many bad days behind us.
So where are things leading?, how can all this end? Pessimists are ready to say that political changes will hardly happen peacefully, without serious turbulence, optimists still believe that the next elections will be the end of the Vučić era.
Serbia is now an unstable country and it is impossible to seriously claim what will happen, when and how it will happen, at least I cannot. One often hears: it's over, it can't be like this anymore... Sometimes I say it myself. But I think that without a clear political strategy and decisive leadership, both of which are widely accepted by the opposition public, such statements are still expressing hope rather than assertion. I heard that this regime considers itself secure in power until 2035. They are mistaken. But I admit that I am a little worried that it has not yet been specified how and who should collect the huge dissatisfaction of citizens and the enthusiasm of student protests, and actually, and not just in words, win, take over power and successfully exercise it. In any case, too much bad is happening today for us to continue like this, and let's hope for the best.
Is it possible?, after all, to say that the government in Serbia has unequivocally and undisguisedly abandoned the European path? In this regard, what is your position on the initiative of German Chancellor Merz, and which we also heard at the summit in Tivat, that the region of the Western Balkans is admitted to the EU through the back door, as associate member countries?
This regime never even wanted Serbia to become a member of the European Union - if you think about it. If, like me, you consider the "European way" to belong to the European values of the rule of law, fair and free elections, control and change of government, solidarity and friendship among European nations, respect for human rights and freedom of the media, which is the fastest way to get there through membership in the EU - that's where I see no similarity with the direction in which the SNS is leading this country.
As for plans to enter through the back door, I think it's another waste of time. If the government wanted Serbia in the EU, it would fulfill the conditions that apply to all members of that community of countries, and we would be full members, as befits a normal state. I know that many people think that entering "by the back door" is actually a way to "draw" Aleksandar Vučić and his regime into a framework that will, step by step, limit their current arbitrariness and trace a path from which they will have nowhere to turn, whether they like it or not. I also know that the gap between the USA and the EU is getting deeper, and I think that Serbia is geographically, historically and civilizationally a European country, and I want it to be politically as well. That means EU membership.
Only, the EU has been pandering to this government for years and "opening chapters" or whatever it's called, although there has been no substantial progress. And so it happened that the regime of the Serbian Progressive Party dragged European bureaucrats by the nose for more than a decade and made the entire process of European integration, even the EU itself, meaningless to a good part of our population. It would be the same with the new plan, based on the same logic of pandering. I personally believe that Serbia should elect a truly European-minded and capable government and quickly become a full member of the EU, in the right way. Not because I am for the EU, but because I am for Serbia and what is best for us.
photo: milica vucković / fonet...
A scandal that both worried and made the entire region laugh bitterly, and beyond, the one with the charter plane full of people of security interest with dubious intentions that the Montenegrin authorities returned from Tivat airport to Serbia in fact, it is just one in a series of countless affairs in which the security services of our country are involved in different ways. What is actually happening in the security sector right now, can we state the key tendencies in the police, the army and secret services?
Nothing was funny to me. Security activity in Serbia today has been reduced to the level of the police service in the so-called Ćaciland. That is their measure, and day by day it is becoming more and more the measure of this country. At the same time, Serbia, step by step, is becoming not only internally unstable but also a factor of nervousness in the region. I'm talking about excesses and conflicts with the authorities of Montenegro, then Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina. And, of course, to the incendiary atmosphere in relations with Pristina - which, admittedly, Pristina cares about much more. None of our neighbors have such complicated and tense relations with the environment as the current government in Serbia. And that does not at all reflect how we - the people and citizens of this country - want to live and how we perceive other countries and peoples around us.
Therefore, the essence of the problem is not in one plane, but in the fact that the security sector has lost its basic purpose. Instead of protecting the constitutional order and citizens, "pouring the truth into the ears of power" and protecting the country from danger, today he serves to - make the leader happy, even if it causes enormous damage to Serbia. It is devastating and dangerous and shameful, not at all funny.
Dobro, and what is, from this not very great distance, What was the meaning of Tivat in your opinion? "epics"? And how do you comment on the regime's propaganda that is, after this event, was quite confused? It was first claimed that they were "athletes, women and children", and then that they were preparing to surprise i "they are happy" Vučić, like for a birthday, and then there was a spin that they were actually some kind of benefactors, which "Montenegrins were not bothered when they came to put out the fire on Luštica"? We just haven't heard the version that they are experts for European integration...
Tivat is a heavy embarrassment on the international stage, and not the first. I will mention Banjska, as well as the "terrorist" act before the elections in Hungary, for the "cutting" of which the Military Security Agency became infamous. Well, the return of a group of our citizens from Moldova, also before the elections... There were other "successes", fortunately less known to the public. When security agencies turn into an instrument to preserve one man and one regime, then they begin to weaken professionally. The results of this can be seen in the ongoing affairs. I am saying that national security affairs and police service in Ćaciland have become one and the same, and the whole world can see the results of that today.
In an interview we conducted "Time" made three years ago, you stated that they "services used to use criminals, and now criminals are using the services". Do you still stand by that assessment or would it be stronger now?? Was it too difficult to assess that organized crime has completely taken control of all state institutions, as can be heard in public?
What is being heard in public today is a consequence, among other things, of what I said three years ago. Because state institutions are afraid of the service, and they are a tool in the hands of some people whose intentions and methods are essentially - criminal. This does not mean that every state institution is criminal, but it does mean that they have lost the ability to stand up to crime when it comes from the top.
And to what extent are they, according to your insights, accurate claims that within the security sector there is great dissatisfaction with personnel changes that took place during the student period civil rebellion, and which implied that the place of loyalists was replaced by the so-called. superloyalists? Has Vučić lost complete control over them?, which is why he surrounds himself more and more visibly with people on the other side of the law, which became his main "Praetorian Guard"?
I don't know if such stories are spread out of wishful thinking, ignorance or to instill fear in the regime. It will be possible to talk about "great dissatisfaction" when the sector starts rejecting illegal orders and supporting individuals who have suffered persecution due to their professionalism. The fact that some secretly report certain information, counting on buying a ticket on another ship or at least clearing their conscience a little, is far from "great dissatisfaction". There are too many policemen who beat and continue to beat students and the people, there are too many security guards who process opposition leaders, there are too many officers who go to party meetings and salute deserters, there are too many of them to be able to speak of these professions as "dissatisfied" today.
Of course, there are many honorable individuals, but that does not change the general picture of integrity within the security sector. At the same time, it is clear that, if some other factor turns everything around, the vast majority of people there will remember overnight that they were in fact "against" all along.
We can't, of course, to bypass the case "Milic", which seriously disturbed the citizens, even those sympathetic to the regime. Were you surprised when this gruesome scandal became public? In your opinion, how did it happen in the first place and how will the government get out of this "to pluck out"?
All that is so abnormal (in the case of Milić - op. author.) that any attempt at rational analysis sounds the same. Although in that case little is as it seems at first glance, I wouldn't bother trying to untangle it right now. Citizens can no longer know where the rumor ends and the fact begins. It is a consequence of the collapse of institutions that people should trust.
You know, there is a court verdict that was passed in 1832 in Kragujevac by Prince Miloš, and the recorder was Vuk Karadžić, about a case in the village of Selevac. In it, literally, with the state seal, the signatures of Miloš Veliki and Vuk, it is written... "let them do the same as they started, let us not interfere in their actions". Well, I wouldn't get involved in that - when I'm not in a position to stop and change everything.
And how will the government solve it? By creating fog, contradicting explanations and counting on the new affair to supplant the old one - just like many times before.
The fact is that the regime has only one weapon left in its hands when it comes to politics, and that is force, i.e. retaliation and intimidation of citizens. To what extent can they demobilize opponents of the regime through fear? Is society breaking or is Charles Morris right, who said that "you can do anything with bayonets, except sit on them"?
Does Serbia actually have the potential to become the Balkan Belarus??
Many have stopped or at some point stop being afraid. But then the next step should follow - disempowering the one who sowed the fear. If this does not happen within a reasonable time, he will change or intensify his tactics, and fear will return and hopelessness will appear. I hope that it will not be like that, but that those who so far have broken the most fear - namely the actors of the student movement, will quickly offer a concrete plan and people for a democratic change of government.
For the end, What would you do in this situation?, that you are still politically and party active they did? What would be your message to the opposition parties, but also student civil movement?
The instability we are in is not accidental, it is the result of the collapse of the country's institutions over a long period of time. And it has reached a point where it is no longer acceptable to us or to the environment. Since I'm not politically active, I don't think it's my job to dictate strategy to those who are. I can only note that no regime has fallen because its opponents were in complete agreement. They fell when people actually knew what they wanted and managed to agree on what was most important.
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