Ivica Buljan of the Split weekly Feral Tribune discusses in the August 4, 1997 issue of this magazine discusses the current position of the Croat exiles from Posavina.
Anton Peranovic Tunja is one of the numerous Posavina Croats who will not be able to vote during the September municipal elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Peranovic has been orderly registered with the OESCE, but, when in accordance with the OESCE he tried to verify the electoral lists in the Regional ceneter for exiles and refugees, his name was not on the list pf tjhe voters for the municipality of Brcko, even though he is a candidate at the elections for the Municipal Council in Brcko.
Actually, due to encountered irregularities during the last years general elections under the auspices of the OESCE, the organizer decided to re-register the electoral body, so that many misuses would be brought to the minimum. But it seems that even this precaution has its misgivings.
Peranovic says that the intention of the Croatian authorites from Zagreb , through Mostar is to persuade as many Posivan Croats as possible to vote in the cities where they live now, and not where they were born, so that they would be able to conduct their shameful policy of trade with Milosevic, so me and those like me that they cannot silence, are bothersome to them.
Peranovic?s words are confirmed by the letter sent to the OESCE by the Posavina Croats who are temporarily or permanently resettled in Glamoc, in which they ask that they be helped or enabled to vote in the places from which they have been exiled. If we, the exiled and runaways, cannot vote in our municipality from which we came from.
From, then we will not vote in Glamoc, nor in any other municipality. We will not vote at all, says the letter.
In the Association of exiled, refugees and resettled from Bosnian Posavina in Zagreb, they are unanimously for the return and against the pressures to remain in the cities where they are now temporarily settled. In the call to all those from Oposavina and all voting age persons and citizens in Bosnia and Herzegovina to vote, they say: Bosina and Herzegovina is a state of all of us, Croats , Bosniaks and Serbs and all others who are born in it and have it as their only homeland.
Mate Gogic, president of the Association stresses that this stance does not meet the approval of Croatian state authorities, even though none of state officials publicly said anything against this position.
The official Croatian authorities come out with veiled statements, but it can be discerned that people are being dissuaded from returning to Posavina. People from Posavina are particularly bitter towards the authorities in Herzebosnia, first of all Jadranko Prlic, whom they see as the person most responsible for the sale and treason of Posavina, of course, with instructions from Zagreb. Named Antun Peranovic also lists other elements which have added to the breakdown of relations in Bosnian Posavina: Our relations with the Muslims were spotless while Stjepan Kljujic was the head of the HDZ. When he was replaced, by we know who, and Mate Boban took over his place the problems began, and the extremists took things into their own hands. With this, the bloody pyre in central Bosnia and Herzegovina could begin. I can openly state, that the Croatian authorities are directly responsible for this conflict, according to whose orders Boban, Kordic and others lead the war, and not politics.
Source: Split weekly Feral Tribune, August 4, 1997
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