Tito's lost world

[Ivo Skoric]

24 years since he died, Tito's legacy is still strong among peoples 
of former Yugoslavia - actually it is stronger now than it was 
immediately following his death. it is as if people first felt 
relieved that a dictator died and hoped for the democracy to come in 
his place, and then when they got war and poverty instead, they 
started to appreciate the good times they had under him. today, 
except for Slovenia and Croatia, economy is worse in all other parts 
of former Yugoslavia.

ivo
ps
sorry for the bad formatting, but i have my right arm in sling...

From: www.iwpr.net
NOSTALGIA GROWS FOR TITO'S LOST WORLD



Social and economic instability prompt many Balkan citizens to yearn 
for a
time of order and prosperity. 



By Marcus Tanner, Muhamet Hajrullahu in Pristina, Drago Hedl in 
Osijek,
Dino Bajramovic in Sarajevo, Mitko Jovanov in Skopje, Vladimir Sudar 
in
Belgrade and Tanja Matic in Subotica



Kaqusha Jashari, head of the Social Democratic Party of Kosovo, has 
fond
memories of the days when she carried the baton for Yugoslavia's late
strongman, President Josip Broz "Tito".



A prominent Albanian politician in the communist regime, she was
selected for the honour of carrying a baton containing a message from 
the
nation's youth to the president in a relay from Slovenia in the north 
to
Kosovo and Macedonia in the south.



The culmination was the handing of the baton to the president in the
army stadium in Belgrade amid cheering crowds on his birthday on May 
25.
"The celebration of worship for Tito fitted in perfectly with the
education we had at the time," Jashari recalled. "It was everyone's
celebration, a festival of youth."  



Jashari's views are less unusual than many think. While four of the 
six
Yugoslav republics are now independent states and Kosovo - still
technically part of Serbia - is desperate to become the fifth, many
inhabitants of the former federation, especially the elderly and 
those
from the poor south, recall Yugoslavia with nostalgia. 



For them it was a time when food and jobs were plentiful, crime was 
low,
ethnic differences were downplayed and difficult political decisions 
were
left to the uniformed Marshal, whose stern features stared down from
thousands of portraits in offices, railways stations, shops and 
homes.



"I was rich in Tito's time, there were factories and handicraft
businesses - we had jobs, we had everything," mused 84-year-old Mehdi
Shabani from Pristina. "The standard of life was far better," added 
Osman
Krasniqi, 62, also a resident of the Kosovo capital. "With a low 
salary
you could build a house - you can't do that now."



Kosovo was the least Yugoslav area of all,  for the simple reason 
that it
was the least Slav.  "Albanians were less connected with Yugoslavia 
than
the other nations because they were the only non-Slavs. All we had in
common was the communist ideology, which was less personal than 
sharing a
language, culture and religion," said Jashari. 



Among the neighbouring Slavs of Macedonia, where locals not only got
jobs and food but their own republic, affection for Tito is far 
greater.
Whereas Tito's once ubiquitous name has been torn down from most 
streets
and squares in ex-Yugoslavia, in the Macedonian capital of Skopje, 
the
largest and most elite school still sports the title "Josip Broz 
Tito" and
each May 25 it honours its patron saint with a folk dance and a
flower-laying ceremony. 



For many Macedonians, poverty-stricken independence has proved a poor
exchange for a secure life in a large Slav federation. "There was no
division between rich and poor, everybody could afford to go to 
school and
have a home and a job," maintained Makedonka Jancevska, 62, a retired
Macedonian language teacher. 



"Patriotism was fostered on a broader scale; it meant respect of
everything related to the uniqueness of all the nations and
nationalities that were part of Yugoslavia."



"The standard of living we had provided us with economic security and 
many
social benefits," recalled Petar Mojsov, 46, a Macedonian accountant.
"Everyone could afford a flat and a car. I travelled to Italy for
shopping. I went to Greece for a vacation whenever I felt like it."



Tose Nackov, an electrical technician, remembers when whole towns in
Macedonia turned out to welcome the birthday baton that youths like
Kaqusha Jashari of Kosovo once proudly carried. 



"We were impatient for the day when it would visit our town," Nackov
said. "It was like a holiday and we would all gather in the square to
welcome it and see it off on its way to another town."



Enthusiasm for Tito's memory is so strong in Macedonia that last year 
a
new association was set up under Slobodan Ugrinovski to celebrate his
life. His 6,180 club members go on trips to (the few) institutions 
still
bearing Tito's name and visit the main shrines, Tito's final resting 
place
in Belgrade's House of Flowers and his birthplace in Kumrovec, 
Croatia. 



As in Macedonia, the hapless inhabitants of war-torn, economically
ruined Bosnia and Herzegovina cannot help but contrast life under 
Tito
with what they have now. To Bosnians, Tito's name is widely 
associated
with "the good old times". 



Far from dimming, the cult of Tito there grows ever stronger. When 
the
authorities recently tried to rename the main street in Sarajevo 
after
Alija Izetbegovic, Bosnia's first post-independence president, the 
city's
inhabitants rose up, hanging a billboard across the boulevard with 
Tito's
image on it and the slogan "This is the Street of Marshall Tito". 
Months
after the initiative collapsed, this billboard remains. 



"The young are turning to Tito because he personified prosperity," 
said
Adnan Koric, a member of the Bosnian Association of Josip Broz Tito. 
"They
know that only during Tito's time we constantly progressed for 45 
years in
every aspect of social and economic life."  



Koric believes Bosnians yearn for the time when they did not need
several currencies and visas to cross what was once a single 
territory.
"Now we cannot spend a tank of fuel driving in a straight line 
without
getting six visas first," Koric joked.  



In Sarajevo, Tito's image has returned from the cellars and second-
hand
shops to popular bars and restaurants. At Tito Bar, a popular haunt 
of
students, young people and professionals, walls are covered in Tito
insignia and photographs while waiters  wear uniforms bearing Tito's
still-familiar signature. "I come here to think about and live in the
past," said 26-year-old Amel. "Whatever some may say, our past was
brighter than our future." 



While Bosnia and Macedonia lost much and gained little from the fall 
of
Tito's Yugoslavia, memories are less rosy in neighbouring Serbia and
Croatia. For more than a decade under the rule of Slobodan Milosevic, 
Tito
was demonised in Serbia as a Croatian enemy who had plotted the 
Serbs'
downfall in Yugoslavia.



But even in Serbia, the disappointments of the past decade, including 
lost
wars and collapsing living standards, have changed minds. Misa 
Djurkovic,
of the Belgrade Institute for European Studies, says a growing 
nostalgia
for Tito's era is related to more than sorrow for lost living 
standards. 



"Yearning for [the old Yugoslavia] is also a yearning for order and
dignity," he said. "Our 'soft' communist dictatorship was, after all, 
a
serious, well-established system in which there were none of the
robberies, chaos and anarchy that are now sadly typical."



Djurkovic believes this nostalgia has even spread to some of the 
younger
generation, "Youngsters today see in Yugo-nostalgia an instrument of
protest against the rotten legacy of the Nineties, which they have
inherited." 



There is certainly no sign of the House of Flowers shutting its doors 
to
pilgrims, though it is a more neglected site than it was in the 
Eighties,
when foreign diplomats and visiting heads of state came to the grave 
to
pay their respects as a matter of course.



But if the crowned heads of state and presidents no longer troop past
Tito's mausoleum, war veterans, communist party members and
non-governmental organisations, NGOs, still return on the late 
leader's
birthday. Svetlana Ognjanovic, the House of Flowers spokeswoman, said 
she
expected up to 2,000 people for this year's commemoration, including 
a
large party of Slovenian Hell's Angels (the motorcyclists have made 
an
annual pilgrimage to the site since 2000).



The head of the Tito Centre NGO, retired army general Stevan 
Mirkovic,
also marks the day with dinners of partisan-style beans and a re-
enactment
of the baton ceremony.  And in Serbia's far north, Blasko Draskic, 
73, has
gone as far as you can in a campaign to restore Tito's memory, 
opening a
theme park named "Yugoland" near the border town of Subotica. 



Mini-Yugoslavia has several of the geographical attributes of the 
former
Yugoslavia, including a hill named after its highest peak, Mt 
Triglav, in
Slovenia. Old flags with red stars flutter around the entrance, while
Tito's portrait adorns every wall, showing Tito hunting, playing the
piano, reading, dancing and paying state visits. Blasko even issues
citizenship papers for Yugoland to visitors, and has enrolled 2,500 
so
far. 



Draskic says the abolition of the name "Yugoslavia" was a crime. "The
government [of Serbia and Montenegro] has killed off the name of the 
best
country, Yugoslavia, the last thing that reminded us of former 
Yugoslavia,
but without asking people for their consent," he said. "I had to save 
it
for all Yugo-nostalgic people who can come here freely to enjoy 
memories
of Tito's time." 



Although Draskic claims visitors are all of ages, the photographs of
celebrations held in Yugoland suggest Yugo-nostalgia is mainly a
middle-aged or elderly phenomenon.  



Among the young people of all republics, interest is small or 
confined to
a ironic cult, a bit like those ex-east Germans who mock-celebrate 
their
communist past by driving Trabant cars and sporting badges with 
communist
slogans.



Aca Bogdanovic, 32, from Belgrade, said he only respected Tito 
"because he
was the greatest hedonist of the 20th century" - hardly the kind of
compliment real devotees appreciate. That kind of ironic appreciation 
is
equally evident in Tito's Croatian homeland where only a handful 
remain
faithful to his political ideas, while a much larger and younger 
group
enjoy experimenting with Titoist motifs.



"It is mostly the young who buy these t-shirts - those who weren't 
even
born when Tito died!" remarked a salesman in Osjek, in northeast 
Croatia
of his stack of t-shirts with Tito's face on them. 



Zagreb sociologist Drazen Lalic says that while only a few older 
people
can be described as truly Yugo-nostalgic, a growing interest in Tito
personally and in the country he once ruled stems from the fact that
Croatia is more at ease with itself now than it was ten years ago. 



"After years of hearing that we belong solely to the Mediterranean or
Central European culture, we are now facing the fact that Croatia 
also
belongs to the Balkan cultural circle," said Lalic.



"Yugo-nostalgia exists but people do not grieve for Yugoslavia as 
their
former state," said Milanka Opacic, of the Social Democratic Party. 
"They
grieve for the quality of life they had. They think they were much 
better
off, safer, had a better standard of living and better health 
protection
than they now have." 



The plain fact is that Yugo-nostalgia no longer antagonises anyone
because no one seriously believes Yugoslavia will ever be recreated. 
In
Croatia, as the country heads towards the European Union, Yugoslavia 
is
seen as a thing of the past - an unsuccessful project that cannot and 
will
not be restored. As a result, Yugo-nostalgics in Croatia are now 
viewed as
romantics, rather than the enemies of the state they were called 
during
the era of Croatia's nationalist, leader Franjo Tudjman.



Marcus Tanner is IWPR Balkan editor/trainer; Dino Bajramovic is 
culture
editor at the Sarajevo weekly, Slobodna Bosna; Vladimir Sudar and 
Mitko
Jovanov are journalists with the Belgrade weekly Reporter and the
Macedonian daily Dnevnik respectively; and Muhamet Hajrullahu, Drago 
Hedl
and Tanja Matic are regular IWPR contributors.
---------------------------------------------------------
Ivo Skoric
19 Baxter Street
Rutland VT 05701
802.775.7257
ivo at balkansnet.org
balkansnet.org