The real question is not why Dodik brought the accordionist to the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, it is, after all, his natural habitat, since he feels most comfortable in a tent with an accordion and a microphone. We also know that Dodik is a roughneck who does not value anyone, not even himself, because with what he did, he said a lot more about himself, than about the state that he belittles while drawing money from it. The question we need to look for an answer for, is why no one prevented it? What did the security of the Presidency of BiH do, which should protect the building itself, but even more a part of this institution? What did the other two members of the Presidency of BiH, Komšić, and Džaferović, do on that issue, especially because he had been announcing it for days? What did Bakir Izetbegović, who called himself the representative and protector of Bosniaks, do on this issue? Since they did nothing to prevent this attempt to insult the highest BH. institutions, one might think that Dodik’s behavior suits them as well because then they can act as protectors of the people, instead of worrying about the economic progress of the state. We can assume what Čović did. He won triumphantly and maliciously, celebrating the election victory in advance.
In recent days, we often hear comparisons of the current situation with the one in 1992, just before the start of the war in BiH. However, this cannot be compared. Back then, we had nationalists in power who wanted to create their great states by kidnapping others, and they were willing to pay for all that with their lives, but not their own, nor the lives of their children. We now have people in power who have only recently discovered nationalism, exclusively as a means of covering up the crime. They do not care about the people of the state, but only about profit and control over the judiciary so that they can enjoy what they have acquired for the rest of their lives, millions stolen from citizens. However, the only similarity is that they are also ready to sacrifice other people’s lives if that is the price to stay in power and freedom. They will relocate to a safe place by running some lucrative business, smuggling, or collecting humanitarian aid around the world.
There will be no war, but no peaceful sleep either
They are not crazy to start a war because they are the ones who have the most to lose. Imposing villas, endless estates to which they turned rivers, tenders, and jobs won by the companies of their children and close friends, comfortable life, luxury travel, wives and children in marked goods, grand weddings, and the like. They are aware of all this, as well as the fact that fear of war leads to automatic amnesia of citizens about all the scandals in which they are involved and the catastrophic economic and political situation in which corrupt, self-proclaimed national leaders have brought us.
Fear in people about a new wave of rising tensions and calling for war reminded me of the beginning of a pandemic when most people had been swallowing news about the coronavirus all day, looking for some life-saving information. Some experts then said that it was best for citizens to just adhere to the prescribed measures, and to avoid over-listening to the news because it would only panic them. It is similar now, people who follow the news think that war will break out tomorrow, and those who do not follow the news do not even think about war. This is illogical because the real danger of war should be visible on the ground as well, and not just in the statements of national leaders. If there was a danger of war, national leaders would buy heavy weapons, ammunition, military planes, and helicopters, prepare people who would die so that they would come out of the new war even richer, set up barricades on the demarcation lines, and everything we did in ’92, with disbelief, and watched as they assured us that there would be no war. Now that they are telling us that there will be a war, there is nothing visible on the ground but to politicians, who are slowly but surely losing power, their mouths are full of threats and recruitment.
Another indication that the story of the war is a bluff, are the visits that certainly would not have happened if there was any danger, not only from the war but also from any incident. The first is the visit of Bakir Izetbegović to Banja Luka, and the second is the visit of Patriarch Porfirio to Sarajevo. They both walked around the city and greeted passersby accompanied by regular security. If there were any signs of wear, these visits would not have taken place or would have been accompanied by much stronger security.
There will be no war, but there will be no peaceful sleep. How can those who do not have a job sleep peacefully, who do not earn enough to feed their families, those who have insecure jobs, who are exploited by employers, whose private jobs are endangered or failed, who do not receive promised subsidies and other assistance, pensioners, socially vulnerable population, war invalids and all those who tell stories about the war to think about leaving the country. We know that their story about the war is a bluff, but foreign investors who visit our country in a wide arc precisely because of constant tensions, and who would be ready to create new jobs in BiH and help the country’s economic progress, do not know that. Not to mention the growing number of domestic entrepreneurs who move their businesses abroad because they do not want their business to depend on blackmail and good connections with under capacitated and corrupt politicians.
The weaker they are, the louder they are
Dodik’s power has been declining for years, but he has managed to preserve it in various ways by making more and more concessions to his coalition partners and accepting more and more flyers into his ranks. There are too many double players, ready to change the jersey for some benefit. Dodik has also been abandoned by longtime coalition partners as they see his end approaching, and when the mice start leaving the ship, you can be sure it is sinking. Dodik is aware that his end is near and that is why he is making desperate moves. Mass protests in Banja Luka have shown that citizens want a better life and are ready to remove an incompetent and corrupt government. The opposition won that battle, but that does not mean that it will win the election war. The question is how much they will be able to take advantage of people’s dissatisfaction and their desire to change the government. For that, they would have to show the voters that they are different and better than Dodik and his followers. Proving that they are bigger nationalists than Dodik will not help them in that, because the citizens are most dissatisfied with the catastrophic economic and social situation, and not with the state of the nation.
Although Dodik is becoming louder, his rhetoric, although at first glance unchanged, is becoming milder. There is no more mention of the referendum, the independence of the Republika Srpska has turned into the independence of the RS within BiH, the blockades of the work of joint institutions have remained only on paper. Dodik openly threatens that the day of imposing EU sanctions will be the day of RS independence. Thus, he does not show courage, but good information, because he knows that the EU cannot reach an agreement on the imposition of sanctions. Dodik does not mention that he had to return to the sessions of the Presidency of BiH, although he proposed blockades and called on others to resign from their jobs. Luckily, people do not fall for his pranks because they would lose their jobs, and I doubt very much that they have financial reserves from which they could live, as Dodik has.
All of them are the same, everything else is nuanced
The ruling parties are aware that they are losing the support of the citizens and that they can expect worse results in the next elections. They are even more aware that these results and the return of the support of the citizens cannot be ensured by their results, because they do not have them. They will open a kilometer of highway before the elections, increase pensions for new debts, give about 50 KM to the socially endangered, there are not enough jobs in the civil service to recruit new voters, election defeats in important local communities have shown that it is no longer so easy to buy voters’ votes, and changes in the Central Election Commission have allowed at least minimal control over the arrogance and electoral fraud of the leading parties. The only way to gain their support is to raise national tensions, and they are doing that. At the same time, at least one side must respond to verbal threats, because without that there is not much effect. And while they play intolerance in public, they throw balls at each other in the background for safe goals.
We are watching these days as Dodik tries to get out of the quicksand into which he has plunged himself. The more it twists, the deeper it sinks. The international community has cornered him. U.S. sanctions against individuals from his inner circle are certain. Vučić is slowly letting him through the water, starting with the meeting with the new High Representative for BiH, with whom Dodik refuses to meet because he denies his legitimacy. They will have the support of Russia as long as it suits them as a trump card for some other agreements. He would like to get out of that quicksand and become a favorite of the international community again, but it is not that easy. How can he break the blockade of state institutions when he has to explain to the citizens that there is no longer that alleged danger to the Republika Srpska, because of which the blockade started? How can he explain to them the meeting with the High Representative, which will inevitably follow, when he denies his legitimacy? How can he explain to them that BiH is unstoppably moving towards NATO membership, thanks to its staff when he told them that they were the enemies of the Serbs?
It will be difficult for him to do it alone, but that is why there are coalition partners who will help him get out of it. In the last few days, Izetbegović has been coming up with new proposals to help Dodik in his exit strategy. Izetbegović proposes that the law on genocide denial is adopted and that it be supplemented with amendments condemning the crimes in the Jasenovac camp during the Second World War because he believes that “in that way, the political representatives of Serbs in Bosnia and Herzegovina would be satisfied”. What Izetbegović does not know is that the law imposed by Inzko does not apply only to the genocide in Srebrenica, but to anyone who “publicly approves, denies, grossly diminishes or tries to justify the crime of genocide, a crime against humanity or a war crime,” and that goes without saying for the crime in Jasenovac. In addition, Izetbegović promises that he will not say that Republika Srpska is a genocidal creation, to at least approve Dodik to give up the blockade. I do not doubt that the Dodik-Ćović-Izetbegović trio, with the help of Komšić and other satellites, will manage to provoke amnesia among voters this time as well.
