The cooking of a frog that does not feel what is happening to it, in the already boiling water, is nearing its end. She is still moving a little, but the tragic fate that hangs over her head is recognizable. Observers are all around, watching in silence. Some laughing contentedly, others not understanding what this is all about. When the last chance to revive her is missed, there is panic and a rush to steal what she left behind…
Cynical, but sadly true. This is how a painfully caricatured story about the events in Bosnia and Herzegovina and towards BiH today, could be briefly told. The phenomenon is not only local but obviously global, but that is a different story. Of course, a “new international order” had to be adapted to systems that grew on the basis of exclusively brutal interests and not once respected principles and international law. And how far have we come here, once respected in that system of values which has been declared totalitarian and dictatorial by the gluttonous and insatiable clowns of the “new democracy”? Well, everything is, here, written in the constitutions, laws, system, organization, judiciary, textbooks. So, who gets whom first?
Only a Frog Knows That
Here’s to starting from something banal, to a joke. “Leaders” have become annoying with their swearing in the Dayton Peace Agreement, and the “leader” of half the state is a man who has reduced the political meaning of his actions to non-recognition of the state, the flag, and even borders… Others do it more cunningly, in “Latin”, so to say, but with a political philosophy with a similar goal. The third is publicly, charitable, giving himself the right, which he doesn’t have at all, to say these days on TV, “… we have accepted special relations between RS and Belgrade…” Who exactly are “we”, in the name of whom he speaks, on the basis of which constitution and law? Only that frog knows.
Following the logic that grotesquely calls itself “principled”, a member of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina who is not constitutionally the exclusive and unquestionable representative of only one nation, but the collective President of the State, becomes one whose life goal is the annulment of BiH – referring to the BiH Constitution?! Well, with that Constitution, he threatens another member of the presidency because he is going to the session of the heads of state and government gathered at the United Nations General Assembly. And they receive him without any problems and listen carefully. Including the UN secretary general, whom the “half-state leader” then accuses of being “involved in the break-up of BiH”. It is exactly here when the situation becomes a joke. So what?
The complete nonsense of such a story about “law”, multiplied by the misery of human size, shows an example of the president’s refusal to allow a helicopter of the Army of BiH to participate in extinguishing fires and saving human lives in Herzegovina. Only a few days later, that same respective member of the presidency, using a helicopter owned by “his” half of the state, would go to that same Herzegovina for a private birthday with the former member of the presidency, now a partner, at the head of another political party. This trio – just ask the frog – at the head of the SDA, HDZ and SNSD, their members, but also the majority of foreigners who serve in BiH, call and treat them as “representatives” of the people. Legitimate ones at that. It would be irrelevant if it were not targeted. And it is enough to make one think, about these strangers and the reasons they are here.
The UN Secretary General and other participants in the 87th session of the UN General Assembly showed, in the case of formal and substantial (illegitimacy) of Komšić’s presence and speech at the UN, enough understanding for the meaning of the problem in BiH. So they listened to an interestingly serious speech by the chairman of the Presidency of BiH, without moving a finger regarding his “non-recognition” of someone there who does not recognize BiH as a complete state with two equal entities. At the same time, sitting in the Presidency, only too, according to his own confession – undermines literally all his decisions. Yet a little too much, even for the new reality of the UN in times of rule, instead of principle.
The pandemic of political chaos in BiH is clearly progressing more and more openly from the neighbourhood. The president of Serbia, as Dodik’s partner in RS, pushed Vulin, his pawn to maintain tension, and now, host a public charade, as the home leader of the epic dream of a united “Serbian world”, wherever he was. What is the new name for the eternal thesis of the radicals on the other side of the Drina, about the rights to the lands on this side of the Drina? The shadow of that “world” spilled over the river, but how could it not be when in its “benevolent Bosniak way”, with an understanding for the “special relations between RS and Belgrade”. A more than unauthorized third “representative of the people” joined in BiH.
Until yesterday, a great hope for many in Bosnia was Christian Schmidt, the high representative of the international community in BiH. His smallest problem is Dodik, who still doesn’t recognize him, but he obviously likes the identification of BiH residents exclusively through “Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats” more and more. And just when the frog’s destiny began to slowly prevail in relation to him, there is Schmidt in Zagreb, in the company of a great friend, Plenković (oh the coincidence), just at the time when the president of that EU country, Milanović, declared stone cold, in New York, that he is unquestionably, “President of all Croats in Croatia and BiH!”
Much has been said about Milanović’s escapades towards BiH, which are simply unbelievable for the character and work of the president of the EU member state, but, as can be seen here, there is no point. This now, in fact, is the least of all concerns in BiH, and how we will, and whether we will survive with ourselves inside, contentious as we are. But the logical question is what the citizens of Croatia would say if, say, Vučić claimed that he was the president of all Serbs in Croatia. Or, here is an even more serious question: What is he going to say about this in Brussels, to which Zagreb “belongs”? And the statement of the first man from Pantovčak – with all the other inconsistencies said in New York at the expense of BiH – is absolutely devastating and dangerous for the Union, its principles; reputation and even a new perception of many in Europe who wanted to join the Union. After all, does Schmidt think that with his silence from Zagreb towards such a Milanović, a president, can have the same attitude of silence as in the treatment of Dodik and his nonsense! An interesting question for Zagreb and for the EU, and even for the vain Milanović.
Trash in Our Own Pockets
Schmidt, from Zagreb, also points to the “need for increased activity of all domestic actors in strengthening the functionality of institutions.” It is normal political logic to invite domestic actors to intensify their activity. But the matter is on the verge of ridicule if it is not seen what the activity of domestic political actors in the institutions of the system in BiH exactly is, beyond the already coordinated attempts to block the institutions until destruction. Those who have infected a country with a political pandemic on a poisoned country that has not been cleared by Dayton know very well that garbage can only be “swept away” by hiding everything previously horrible in one’s own pockets.
A lot of it is already a bit late, with serious conversations with the wrong people about the too serious situation of the so-called state, politics, politicians and their infected and fed subjects. The meaning of their policy and survival is in a new fight one against two today, the other two against one tomorrow, and all three together against all the others the day after tomorrow. With a great misunderstanding of Europe for a lot of what is happening here. And in charge of us. Or, perhaps, with full understanding but also some plan we don’t know about. What pandemic operatives say: Close borders, stay home, watch television and read news portals? Not bad either compared to what happens when a frog dies. After all, a lot of us remember that, but it’s just not true because the old, textbook saying, hasn’t been learned: Repeating the same mistakes several times is not exactly an illustration of intelligence.
In politics, especially.