The outlines of what is now called the Serbian Progressive Party, which has been riding on the backs of Serbian citizens for the past 170 months, became visible even before the party was officially founded. Specifically - in the pre-election campaign of the Serbian Radical Party with Tomislav Nikolić at the head (while Šešelj waged an obscene war against the Tribunal in The Hague) for the republican parliament in 2008. The list still contained Seselj's name in its name, the slogan was "Forward, Serbia", and the campaign tried to unite the ultra-nationalist weft and pro-European politics.
Approximately, we want to join the EU, no problem, but under our conditions, with all of Kosovo and Metohija and Russophilia in the luggage. Some version of "populism plus", so-called politics. of the "big tent" with numerous elements of political schizophrenia retained to a large extent until today: the creators of this party, whoever they were and however it was carried out in practice, judged that it was not possible to gain power in Serbia with ordinary radicalism.
In addition, the campaign was focused on the so-called to ordinary people who were the losers of the transition and/or irreparably infected with "bloody patriotism". The message to them was that the post-October 5th government had looted and impoverished Serbia, and that at the same time the national identity, whatever it was, had been destroyed. They are not radicals against foreign investments or the West, but they do not want to see the "selling out of Serbia" and general corruption. The government is presented as a union of ministers, tycoons, interest groups and criminals who are getting rich while the citizens are poor.
Conflicts within the radicals were more visible before, but they escalated four months after the election. The team led by Tom broke away from the radical parliamentary club and founded its own, under the name "Forward, Serbia". The reason for the split was Nikolić's "shocking", albeit conditional, but still support for the ratification of the Stabilization and Association Agreement with the EU. The party was officially founded in October 2008, and before that, Vučić seemed to be in doubt as to which empire to support, so he became the deputy president of the SNS.
Now, what was happening in the political background of this schism and the "Europeanization of the progressives"?
Some things we know, and some things we can only guess. WikiLeaks brought us a confidential cable from the US Embassy from November 2008, in which it is written that the famous Miki Rakić, Tadic's closest associate at the time, told the deputy ambassador that six months earlier, Tadic had instructed him to encourage Nikolic to break away from the SRS. Whatever the truth, there is no doubt that the then ruling DS supported Tom and his friends: this was evident from the media support and because the parliamentary administrative committee enabled the breakaway progressives to retain their mandates in parliament, for many of them against the law.
Allegedly, the idea was to create a broad pro-European bloc, which would enable Serbia to gallop towards EU membership, and to somehow bring the ultra-nationalists to their senses. There was also talk in the bazaar about the creation of some kind of two-party system or a joint government of the DS and progressives. In the end it ended the way it did.
Immediately after its establishment, the SNS starts its pre-election campaign. Inside they disseminate a mixture of patriotic and populist tiles, and outside they tour Western countries and sell Eurofanatic bricks. We will never know what they promised in Western capitals, but it is certain that some European leaders are still satisfied with what was delivered to them.
photo: tanjug / nemanja jovanovićONCE UPON A TIME, THEY PLAYED MODERATION: A. Vučić and T. Nikolić
FIRST PROGRESSIVE ELECTIONS
Thus, SNS presented itself as a modernized right wing. This is how she performed in the 2012 elections, after which she won power thanks to the support of the SPS and Mlađan Dinkić. Later, support came from various other parties of the post-October 5 government, either individually or collectively. For many parties that came close to the SNS, except for the minority ones, it practically meant their dematerialization. SPS was the only one that survived - conditionally speaking.
The main slogan of the campaign was "Let's start Serbia", and Toma Nikolić was the undisputed leader. The progressives managed to preserve a good part of the radical electorate, which was not bothered by pro-European messages. The progressives had an ultra-nationalist certificate, and their voters knew or felt that this talk with Europe was something that had to be swallowed, that is, that it was essentially frivolous. They were more politically literate than those who believed that Serbia with "treated radicals" could join the EU.
The focus of the campaign was corruption, poverty, questioning of controversial privatizations and so on. It suited the progressives that the world economic crisis shattered Serbia's already fragile economy. Progressive voters did not mind the fact that Toma, with a glass of wine in his hand, told them that he had "secured his family" and that he was now planning to "secure the citizens of Serbia". And the fact is that the progressives "secured" many of them.
END OF TOM'S CAREER AND VUCIĆ'S RISE
After the elections for the president of Serbia (the presidential and parliamentary elections were held simultaneously), Tomislav Nikolić made a catastrophic political mistake. He resigns from the position of party president, and Aleksandar Vučić becomes the new leader. Although he was president for five years, Toma actually ended his political career then and runs the lap of honor. Vučić gradually marginalizes him and turns him into a caricature.
The early parliamentary elections, called in 2014, had only one goal: for Vučić to jump from the position of "first vice president" to the position of Prime Minister of Serbia. The ground was prepared in advance: the media, the secret services and many, many others (some would like it to be forgotten now) blew the wind at his back, the "cult of the leader" was systematically created. The focus of the campaign was the fight against corruption and difficult reforms with a clear message: political changes are not enough - a "strong leader" is important!
Already in these elections (as well as in the previous local elections that have been held since the progressives came to power), numerous "irregularities" were noticed, all with bald people, jeeps, pallia, capillary votes and dramatic abuse of the media. It's just that hardly anyone paid attention back then. Parallel to that was the systematic destruction of political opponents and critics.
Vučić is preparing for the presidential elections in 2016, he has support from both the left and the right, complete control of the media, a well-developed clientelistic-criminal pyramid and a party organized as a paramilitary formation. The motto of the progressives' campaign for the special elections that year (called to demonstrate force, practice election theft and prepare the presidential campaign) was: "Aleksandar Vučić - Serbia is winning". Approximately, we have done miracles, achieved terrifying economic successes, which were pumped in the media according to the North Korean model, now we need support again. Vučić is a leader admired by the whole world. And so on.
Vučić's name is in the foreground on the progressive electoral lists for the parliamentary elections in 2020 and 2022. At the first, the motto of the progressives was "For our children" along with Vučić's name. Thus, a futuristic and intergenerational component was added. We have reformed the reforms, there is nothing more to reform, now is the time for development, we are building roads, schools, hospitals, factories, our children will live like kings. The 2022 campaign has the motto "Together we can do everything": again a look into the future, but also a focus on stability that only Vučić can provide us, in the context of the pandemic and various world crisis problems. "Peace, stability, Vučić" is one of the slogans, which coincides with the motto of Viktor Orban in the elections held on the same day in Hungary - "Peace, stability, Orban".
THE FIGHT AGAINST CORRUPTION IS SLOWLY FORGOTTEN
photo: amir hamzagić / tanjug...
Over time, the fight against corruption disappeared from both the regime's media and progressive campaigns. It was mentioned only in the context of the "former government". If something is not mentioned, it does not exist, they thought.
And then followed the tragedy in Novi Sad and the political earthquake that changed Serbia and caught the government unprepared. An "unexpected force" appeared on the scene - the students. How do progressives respond? With violence, they beat and arrest children who were promised a better future, they persecute political opponents even more... They see that they are losing the support of their soft voters and parts of the institutions, and they are frightened by the fact that the abstinences have woken up.
Although, as our interlocutors say, tents with liver music, pork and alcoholism appeared in some form during the entire radical-progressive career, in this election campaign, at least that's how it seems now, they are becoming its most important element. This is how the progressives address their basic electorate, a pauperized paradise whose cognitive functions have been threatened by their informational program for a decade and a half.
It is not a shame to be poor and uneducated, is the main message of that campaign. When they sing and dance under the tents, the progressives say that they too are similar to paradise. They have a little more money, but that's okay. And the others - students, educated and others - are rich scumbags who read some dangerous books, listen to dope music and want to get hold of the government in order to take away everything they have from paradise. As the saying goes - we had nothing, and then the occupiers came and took everything from us!
Corruption can no longer be hidden, and in this sense, the website "Ko si bre ti" has been widely promoted, where citizens can report corruption and other abuses of power and authority to the president. In appearance, the president is poor, honest and good, but those around him muddy the waters. When he finds out, everything will be bursting with justice, truth, health and joy.
SPASOJEVIĆ PROGRESSIVES AGAINST "URBAN AND ALIENATED"
Professor at the Belgrade FPN Dušan Spasojević comments for "Vreme" about the beginnings of the progressive tent campaign. Is it different from previous campaigns and, if so, to what extent and why?
"I'm not sure that the SNS campaign will be significantly different from the previous ones, but for a final assessment we will have to wait until we see it in its full form. We have seen tents before, albeit to a lesser extent, and above all I see them as a way for SNS leaders to reconnect with their base and convince voters that they are ordinary people like them — people who love tents, baking and rounds. The longer you are in power, the harder it is to maintain such an image," says Spasojević.
He believes that progressives present their challengers as their complete opposite: as young, educated, urban and alienated. And that's not strange. Urban and alienated - that's the image SNS has been building about its opponents for a long time.
"This part of the campaign, therefore, is intended primarily for older and rural voters. It remains to be seen what will be offered to those who expect something more than a tent," says Spasojević.
photo: tanjug / amir hamzagićIT IS IMPORTANT TO HAVE FUN: Progressive tents all over Serbia
CARRY BORAT CAMPAIGN
However, the president of the SRCE party, Zdravko Ponoš, says that it is already clear that this progressive campaign will definitely be different from all the others. He recalls that he christened it the "Borat-campaign" and says that he is glad that the term has been "received" by the public because it "well describes what Vučić and the progressives are doing now".
"With this campaign, the progressives try to 'anchor' their hard electorate, and on the other hand, they want to put the awakened abstainers back to sleep. They do this by criminalizing political opponents, regardless of whether they are from political parties or are recognized as people who could be on the student list. At the same time, they produce conflicts between political opponents. Even where political views and differences are not particularly important, they try to make it a big issue and a main topic. And finally, they try to disavow anyone who says anything critical about this government and its results", says Ponoš for "Vreme".
He adds that the progressives have had various campaign phases since their foundation until today. The first is "Tomo's phase", under, as he says, the motto "Carp sweater winding, come Tomo ravines". It was the campaign that brought them to power, and they all hid behind Tom.
"The second phase begins when Vučić takes over the party and real power. Then he tried to get closer to civil Serbia, the non-governmental sector and the media. That was the time when he managed to take a photo with Sonja Licht. I would call that the urbanization phase. The third phase is, conditionally speaking, the suburbanization phase - a return to oneself. Markets, halls, Dodik, light notes. This is where the closing of the circle begins," says Ponoš, adding that he would call this progressive campaign, which "goes even deeper," "atavistic".
"It goes all the way back to Pašić - the glorification of indolence and opanak. That's how Pašić worked: he celebrated opanak and spent his summer in Kvarner with his family. It's the same today: paradise under a tent, and they go to Dubai! The Borat phase means tents, music like 'Sing even when you're crying.' This is a way to strengthen that electorate", says Ponoš.
He also notes a change in the use of Vučić's name in the campaign. Now, in his opinion, we have reached the stage when Vučić's name is no longer worth what it used to be, so now everyone is hiding behind Serbia. That is why the slogan "Serbia wins", that is why we are all the destroyers of Serbia, and they are its defenders.
"The site 'Who are you?' It is clear to Vučić that it must be well thought out. It is true, they can't hide it, I will deal with it. That way, they will establish a direct relationship with their voters Pride.
B. STOJKOVIC PEACOCK IN THE TEETH OF A PREDATOR
Biljana Stojković, activist, professor at the Belgrade Faculty of Biology and member of the Democratic Party, tells us that she does not see a big change in the quality of the progressive campaign in recent years. The difference is in the increase in quantity and intensity, which is why the campaign turned into completely stripped-down primitivism and even more aggressive propaganda. He adds that it is clear that Vučić lacks imagination and new ideas.
"There is nothing new to offer, because he has already promised everything and anything so many times, prepared packages with pate, sugar and noodles, gave money, faked phone calls with orders to this or that minister, organized tents with folk singers and pigs on a spit. You know, in evolutionary biology there is a phenomenon of 'irrepressible selection' that describes the relationship between the male and female sexes during periods of reproduction. It is common for one sex to choose partners, and the other tries to be as attractive as possible, maximizing the number of individuals with which they will have relations and consequently get a large number of offspring. It has been shown that the sex that chooses evolves a preference for the characteristics of future partners, which is why the selective pressure for the evolution of increasingly larger and more intense attractants increases. attractive, on the other hand, such as for example, a peacock's tail. The problem arises when the increase of such features becomes a danger to survival, because the peacock is beautiful and flashy, but also visible to predators. I see the behavior of the progressives and their boss through that prism. They have nothing qualitatively new that can attract voters, the threshold of attractiveness has long been reached, ie. confidence in their politics raised so much that it does not even guarantee them success in reproduction, i.e. elections", she says.
She believes that Vučić has been very aware, for at least ten years, that he is not acceptable to the more educated part of the population. He received a rejection at the very beginning of his rule, in 2012, when he offered many distinguished and accomplished people to join his politics through various positions.
"He attracted only some professional politicians whom he previously called 'yellow thieves' and they remained loyal to him until today or joined over time; in fact, with Vučić, they got the opportunity to continue and strengthen their lucrative businesses. His contempt for more educated citizens, and especially for the university that educates these people, grew over the years. I think he quickly realized who he was addressing and applied the strategy of making those people increasingly dependent on him and his party. The impoverishment of citizens, which primarily affects lower-educated and lower-qualified citizens, we can understand it as the incompetence and indifference of people in power to get rich, but also as a deliberate policy of tying millions of people to themselves; it has been transferred to the ruling party, where giving depends on obedience and loyalty," says Biljana Stojković.
In any case, she says, the aesthetics of that layer of society has been deliberately degraded over the years in order to make it as far as possible from the "average cultural preferences", especially those that we associate with the more educated part. The progressives have done everything to divide us in every way, even in that field, she concludes.
photo: tanjug / jadranka ilić...
VOŠTINIĆ TORTURE TENTS
Kraljevac activist Predrag Voštinić tells "Vreme" that the campaign conceived in this way, although it seems like a natural aesthetic progressive reach, is nevertheless the result of thorough research. It certainly shows the intention to respond to the so-called separation of the ruling and richest stratum from real people, as the last "attempt to resuscitate enthusiasm in the dead spirit of omnipotence".
"There is something very sickening in those pictures under the tent, something similar to those circus shows in which people with certain defects appear. So the show should not be funny, but sickening. In addition, because it is clear that billionaires have a hard time being forced to mix with the 'plebs'. And what a great show it could be if only someone took the microphone and told the ruddy people that the minister they are currently flirting with was, just a few days ago, on the weekend visited the final of the World Cup in football, spent more than all those under the tent, together, on all their needs in a year. So that these entertainment rehabilitators who are the only ones who agreed to scream criminal chords and to whom a few thousand promised euros mean a lot, can hear it, "says Voštinić.
He adds that the progressives boast that they are always in the campaign, but the truth is that they were in the real campaign only until they took power and hijacked the media. Since then, the campaign has been fully supported by propaganda, very expensive and devoid of any scruples.
"From the role of false victims and calls for pity, through calls to deal with corruption, they very quickly waded into epic waters glorifying a very complex being as the personification of everything a society needs. Hence these tents now do not say much about their image. It is too late now to convince anyone of their democratic or any political nature. They now offer tents like Noah's arks on which they offer a place 'only for their own'. The invitation to board is a tried and tested recipe of all loser autocrats who can no longer hide their nature, with an important message that runs through every action: as long as you are with us, no one can touch you and you will certainly be above the law. And the pragmatic idiot has always valued his own certainty the most," Voštinić told "Vreme".
