Montenegro really got a crisis this year, huh? I don't remember if it started in late 2019 or early 2020, but ever since the DPS decided to make a new law about religion and stuff (despite the head of that party being an atheist), the Mitropoly of Montenegro and the Litoral, itself a part of the Serbian Orthodox Church, supported by, not just many devout believers, but also the conservative, right-wing, serbist coalition DF, the largest oppositionary political grouping, went to protest on Thursdays and Sundays in litanies. That is, until COVID reached Montenegro. The whole earlier mentioned law is kinda controversial, and, from what little I understand, it infringes a bit on the religious freedom stipulations from the constitution? Anyways, DPS has dominated Montenegrin politics for 3 decades, and more recently they (or, rather, Milo, their leader, together with his inner circle) had started going more authoritarian. The only way I can describe what I see here is like what Putin and his ER party have done in Russia, but, like, politically centrist. Anyways, the first wave of COVID passed here with a pretty low number of fatalities, even if you take into account the fact that Montenegro's population is just over two thirds of a million. The hardest hit area by percentage of population was, I think, the Tuzi municipality (unrelated, but its demographics are largely made up of Catholic Albanians). But barely has the first wave ended when all hell broke loose in the Budva municipality (if you ever heard of any tourist spots in Montenegro, it (much to my chagrin, since I'm more of a Korita, Čanj, Buljarica, Petrovac and Njivice type'a person) would probably be Budva). Y'see, in the most recent municipal parliamentary and presidential elections, a large chunk of the opposition banded together, narrowly defeating DPS and its coalition partners to take the government there. It was DF and a centre-right party, the Democrats (also supportive of the litanies), calling the shots, but this oppositional coalition also included the SNP (another supporter of the litanies), DEMOS, SDP, URA, as well as (weirdly, considering they sided with the DPS on the whole litany crisis) the LP and the Montenegrin. However, the DPS and their SD coalition partners managed to get a majority more recently by making new coalition partners. The oppositional coalition saw this as an unlawful power-grab, them and their supporters protesting, and the president of the municipality rejecting to abandon his post when the DPS tried to put their own candidate into position. Police was sent in, and, in a story that surely must look familiar to anyone following recent events in the USA, deployed tear-gas, beating the protesters and arresting the municipal president. The thing is, though, the regular police may be in the hands of the national government, but the communal police was in the hands of the municipal government, which, weirdly, caused an inter-police conflict. In the following days, the crowd responded to police violence with violence of their own. The police in Budva are outnumbered. In a horrific act, the police even deployed a few canisters of teargas at a local elementary school, which ended up breaking a window of the school gym, forcing the kids and their teachers to evacuate the gym immediatelly. Some Budvan protesters were holding signs saying "We'll get 50% less tourists, but we got a 100% more presidents.", referring to the earlier-mentioned dispute over the municipal presidency. A bit before that, but also kinda more simultaneously, and also affecting me personally more (due to me being forced to make circuitous routes during my walks in attempts to avert the crowds) the litanies re-started during the dying days of COVID's first wave. Given the whole authoritarianism and police brutality things, I was considering temporarily taking the side of the wider opposition against the DPS and its allies, especially after watching some facebook vid by a guy from Cetinje denouncing the DPS' authoritarianism and corruption, but also criticing the opposition for not unifying on a national scale and being more talk than act with the whole "caring about the people" BS they always mention - a vid that kinda speaks volumes, given that the Cetinje municipality is a DPS stronghold. The second wave of COVID is beginning, this time with the Rožaje municipality (unrelated, but it is largely Muslim Bosniaks in demographics) being hit the hardest, which will probably put yet another pause to the political crisis we've been having. Also, remember how I mentioned that I was considering temporarily aligning with the opposition against DPS, despite my hate for the DF and similar right-wing parties/coalitions? Yeah, today a reason emerged for me to back-pedal on that. About a year ago, a bill was introduced to parliament to allow the issuance of same-sex "union" certificates (similar to what they do in several municipalities in Japan, as you may well know), but it got dropped for whatever reason. Now the bill was re-introduced, and the situation, at least from the information I gathered from the news earlier today, the DPS, SD, several minor coalition partners of theirs and various minority parties are largely supporting the bill, while the DF, Democrats, SNP, DEMOS, URA, and FORCA (the largest Albanian party here in Montenegro), amongst others being against the bill, some because they just want to show the middle-finger to DPS, some because they consider it an insult to the traditional family, but most because of both. Only the SDP remains silent on the issue, and their support may tip the scales one way or another. (Then again, no wonder SDP hasn't stated their opinion, given their leader found it necessary to instead participate on some non-governmental panel about the warcrimes of Montenegrin soldiers and state committed during the Yugoslav Wars (I only really remember the Siege of Dubrovnik by name, but they did mention others, which I just happened to forget since the time they mentioned it)). Another item added to my list of grievances against the DF.
last edited at Jun 30, 2020 6:21PM
