Significant demonstrations have occurred across Bosnia and Herzegovina in recent weeks. On 5 February, thousands of workers, students and unemployed flocked to the northern city of Tuzla’s government building to protest the closure and privatisation of local factories.
Demonstrators occupied the streets surrounding the cantonal building and called for the resignation of those responsible. “Elections will change nothing”, said one participant. “Only actions like this, and I’m afraid, even more radical actions can force our politicians to step down.”
Police used tear gas and violence to disperse the crowd
One in five people in Bosnia lives below the poverty line. The unemployment rate is almost 45 percent – for youth it is 60 percent – and access to health care and tertiary education is inadequate. These conditions have left many nostalgic for the times of Tito and repressive Stalinist Yugoslavia.
Solidarity demonstrations spread to Sarajevo, Mostar, Bihac and Zenica. All attacked the country’s political elite. Demands included returning the factories to the workers, free health care, prosecution of corrupt politicians, a new government that would not come from the existing political class and equalising the pay of government employees and industrial workers.
Protesters denounced the entire justice system, their placards reading, “Courts and police, they are all protectors of the gangs in power.”
In Sarajevo, thousands surrounded the presidential building and called for revolution. At the same time, workers struck across the city. Employees at the Sarajevo Hotel refused to resume work until they received their salaries and had their health and social insurance paid.
Many complained that they had not received payments for the last three months and had not had their health and social insurance paid for more than three years. Workers occupied the hotel, leading to its closure for the first time in 30 years.
By the third day, protests had erupted in more than 30 cities across the country. In Sanski, protesters set alight the holiday home of Sanjin Halimovic, the minister for development. Some firefighters even refused to help put out the blaze. “Why would I help a man who buys luxury cars with taxpayer money?”, asked one.
Protesters across the country were breaching police lines, ransacking government buildings and setting them alight. At this stage local government ministers were announcing their resignations, and police officers in Tuzla were joining the ranks of the protesters after people chanted, “Take off your helmets and join us!”
Government officials and the media condemned the protesters. Serbian deputy prime minister Aleksander Vucic said, “There is no need to solve political problems by setting buildings on fire, using violence and beating police.”
Protesters were unrepentant. New placards emerged reading, “He who sows hunger, reaps rage!”
Significantly, there has been unity among workers of different ethnicities. Bosnian Serb, Croat and Muslim workers have all united in opposition to the political ruling class. Protesters held signs reading, “We are hunger in three languages” and “Muslims, Serbs and Croats are here together, how are you going to distract us now?”
Nationalism has been a potent and divisive force in the Balkans for several decades and was necessary for capitalism to flourish following the death of Tito in the 1980s.
Bosnia was the most ethnically diverse of the former Yugoslav republics and also had some of the most militant workers and strongest trade unions. It became necessary for the rising nationalist ruling class to divide the workers and weaken their power.
The brutal expression of nationalism was achieved through civil war, which resulted in the country being split into the Serb Republic and the Bosnian Federation.
As well as workers of all ethnicities, women are also participating in the demonstrations. Women in Bosnia are often relegated to the home, but over the past few weeks they have been leading chants against the police and organising political discussion groups at local universities.
These are still early days. The challenge for the left now is to continue to foster unity amongst the workers and to win people to an alternative world view that focuses on the needs of the many and not just the wealthy elite.
