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Thursday, April 11, 1996
SERBIA's DEMOCRATS NEED SUPPORT
By Veran Matic
BELGRADE - What does it feel like to be the editor of an independent radio station in
Belgrade today? It's like being under siege. The same answer will be given today by many
young urban intellectuals in Serbia when asked what their lives are like. We remain where we
are, with only our determination and readiness to struggle for the principles we believe in.
From the very outset, Radio B92 was not only a place from which we broadcast an authentic news
program, but also the hub of an entire antiwar, pro-democracy movement. Our activities are intended
only to enlighten - not to brainwash or proselytize, but to help individuals resist all forms of dogmatism.
Our radio station has been broadcasting on a provisional frequency for more than five years now. It can
be interrupted at any moment, and because of our unregulated frequency status we are unable to extend
the geographic range or our broadcasts (beyond Belgrade). Indeed, outside Belgrade, inhabitants of
Serbia have almost no access to non-government media and therefore little unbiased information about
domestic and international events. The only way we could reach the outlying regions was to link up with
local, independent radio stations in Serbia and Montenegro, which retransmit parts of our program.
This line of work is not only a daily struggle to get out the truth, but a battle with red tape and countless
technical problems. Every day is a race for electricians and spare parts. Every day we receive ever
bigger bills from the communal services department. It's a constant struggle to avoid being ripped off.
Every day I call the local officials, begging, so that we can be hooked up to a few more telephone lines
(we have also become providers of an Internet service).
In addition to the radio program, we organize programs in our own independent cultural center,
"Cinema Rex". We are also publishers of books and magazines like David Owen's "Balkan Odyssey"
and Laura Silber and Alan Little's "Death of Yugoslavia". We have our own music and television
production unit, we organize exhibitions, and we communicate with all parts of the former Yugoslavia.
We managed to organize mass actions against the war and humanitarian aid for the refugees.
While providing these services, we must at the same time resist the growing repression in Yugoslavia.
The state has recently taken over the independent television station NTV Studio B, and has closed
down the Soros Yugoslavia Foundation and all of its humanitarian relief, as well as its cultural, scientific
and media projects. These were important elements in a growing, but still disparate, opposition
movement. Citizens need to be encouraged to resist.
The Belgrade regime and its own media arms launches daily attacks, most of them hysterical in tone,
against the democratic wing of the opposition. Responding to these attacks by disseminating more
information, more real news and analysis, helps. But the main, everyday challenge is to remain normal.
In a country that has turned toward a Chinese model of economics and politics, in which during the
congress of the leading party ovations were reserved for the representative of Cuba, in which politics is
criminalized and criminality politicized, it is only with great difficulty and effort that one retains peace of
mind.
I am aware that the authoritarian regime has no wish to understand us, much less accommodate our
work, but it comes as something of a surprise that the developed, democratic world has not fully
grasped that without democratization in the territories of the former Yugoslavia, there will be no peace
in the Balkans. Perhaps some of the reticence from the West stems from the belief that Serbia's
opposition doesn't offer a viable alternative to the powerful President Slobodan Milosevic. Yet for the
first time, the democratic opposition here has turned for its model to European and American ideals
rather than flirting with nationalist sentiments. Their rallies have more EU flags present now than symbols
of Serbin nationalism. Europe and the U.S. must not fail to make use of this readiness to oppose
totalitarianism in Serbia.
President Slobodan Milosevic must be compelled to comply with European and international standards
in the field of human and minority rights, and freedom of the press. The mild reaction of international
public opinion and politicians concerning the repression of democratic and independent institutions in
Serbia only encourages the Belgrade regime in their conviction that the West will continue to tolerate
repression in Belgrade so long as Mr. Milosevic pretends to play along with the peace game. It's time
the West see that a democratic alternative, against all odds, is taking root. It needs help to grow.
(Mr. Matic is editor-in-chief and founder of Radio B92 in Belgrade)
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