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| SERBIA AND MONTENEGRO: OTPOR Movement Ceased to Exist |
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2004-09-13 12:03:20 |
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“Otpor” (Resistance) Movement, one of the symbols of resistance to the regime of Slobodan Milosevic, disappeared from the political scene in Serbia with its integration into the Democratic Party (Demokratska Stranka – DS).
In its attempts to survive on the political scene in the six years of its existence, Otpor underwent several transformations, including the period of action as political party last year.
There were earlier initiatives from Otpor officials to integrate in some of the leading political parties, One such initiative failed in mid-1999, when Boris Karajicic, one of the most prominent leaders of the movement, proposed integration with Momcilo Perisic’s Movement for Democratic Serbia (Pokret za demokratsku Srbiju – PDS).
Due to insurmountable differences in opinion, many prominent members left Otpor over the years and continued their political engagement in one or the other political party.
As students’ movement, Otpor was founded in October 1998 by a group of students at the Belgrade University, dissatisfied with the work of the existing academic organizations and the failed June 1998 protests against the restrictive Law on Universities in Serbia, which led to the firing of a great number of University Professors.
Pokret je stekao pristalice i na drugim univerzitetima u Srbiji, a njihovi aktivisti poceli su javno da demonstriraju zahteve za demokratske promene pod sloganima "Slobodni i fer izbori", "Slobodan, depolitizovan univerzitet" i "Slobodni i nezavisni mediji".
The movement was joined by prominent personalities from all layers of society: university professors, lawyers and other professionals, culture and arts.
The movement soon spread to many cities and towns in Serbia, and grew into a mass movement of political opponents to the Milosevic’s regime. Members of Otpor wrote the popular tune “Gotov je” (He’s done with!!), the symbol of resistance to Milosevic and his clique.
At first, the authorities in Serbia responded to Otpor actions with a media defamation campaign, claiming that Otpor is an enemy organizations. During the Election Campaign for the 2000 Elections, a great number of Otpor activists was arrested and tortured.
During the bombing of then-Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Otpor “froze” its activities and many of its activists joined the Army reserves.
Prior to the fall of Milosevic’s regime in the 2000 Elections, Otpor had close to 90,000 members. After the changes of October 5, 2000, the membership has fallen to some 20,000.
In February 2000, the students’ movement Otpor held the founding assembly at which the name was changed to National Movement Otpor. Three months later, the movement transformed into and NGO with the same name.
In November 2000, Otpor won the “Free Your Mind” MTV award for freedom of speech and respect for human rights.
Three years after the fall of Milosevic, Otpor called the citizens of Serbia to gather again on October 5, 2003, to express their dissatisfaction with the rule of the Democratic Opposition in Serbia (DOS). They publicly apologized to the citizens for the failure to be tougher on DOS actions.
In the three years, Otpor established the Truth Enforcement Service and brought criminal charges against 500 officials of the former regime. Otpor also started the “Resist Organized Crime” Campaign.
In November last year Otpor transformed into a political party and participated in the Parliamentary Elections, in which it won about 60,000 votes. The list of Otpor was headed by professor Cedomir Cupic.
Source: http://see.oneworld.net
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The Event: SEEF 2004
