Regular commentator of the Sarajevo weekly "Svijet," Nijaz Durakovic, analyzes the political background of the pre-election voting polls and their influence on the election results in the August 30, 1998 issue of this weekly.

The electoral tactics are quite different, and everyone is adapting according to the depth of their purse, that is, depending on the finances they have available. From that standpoint, the evident advantage goes to Coalition for the Unified and Democratic Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Croatian Democratic Union of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is obvious that the Coalition opted for a new election strategy: large group posters (already called Ali Baba and forty robbers) posted on the main billboards of the most frequent crossroads, quiet operation house to house, around local communities, villages, as well as strengthened political activity within the religious communities, where hundreds of imam’s position themselves in the role of specific political commissars who abide strictly to the agreed political platform. It itself boils down to well trodden concepts: the Coalition, that is, the Party of Democratic Action is solely capable to maintain the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina, it is the only true defender of Islam and Muslim tradition, s well as a guarantor of survival and national emancipation of Bosniaks.

Within this quiet strategy, the main trump card of the Coalition and the SDA is Alija Izetbegovic’s charisma, strengthened with side players such as Haris Silajdzic, Edhem Bicakcic, as well as with anemic Rasim Kadic and controversial Ibrahim Spahic, is being kept for the finals. The tactic is that the strength is not depleted through mass gatherings and parties, while the fact that the Coalition candidates are at the main governing positions in the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Federation (Izetbegovic, Silajdzic, Ganic, Bicakcic, Kadic, etc) is used as much as possible to cram the media.

At the same time, there is an ongoing series of opinion polls , most of which are directed from party centers or other involved players. All these polls, public opinion researches and similar have:
a) in general, political connotations and a known, domestic or foreign sponsor; b) they have a function of preparing the public opinion and favoring this or that party; c) they are in general, done in an amateurish and unprofessional manner; d) as a rule, they are multiplied and are being offensively positioned ahead of all elections; e) the majority of the customers for these polls come from the ranks of the ruling parties, while the tailored results have the function of maintaining triumphalism, that is, winning psychology.

The real cause for this theme is a recent statement of Carlos Westendorp, who said that, according to the research done, maybe by his Office, or by somebody from a multitude ordered by the OESCE - that the opposition will win around 25 percent, that the rating of the SDP is on the rise, that it is falling for some other parties and similar. This has been repeated later on by his high official. Even if we surmise that these are really relevant and thoroughly based indictors, a question is posed of the goal of presenting these results.

One group (in minority) thinks that this is encouragement for the opposition, a specific pre-electoral support and proof that the national parties are finally losing their monopoly.

Others have a completely different opinion. This expected percentage could be seen as a success only for the uninitiated. What is forgotten that in 1990, the year of the triumph of the nationalistic parties, the opposition (SDP, Reformists, MBO, Liberals, etc.).won 25,6 percent, which was not enough for the international community to accept the opposition as an equal partner in negotiations concerning the fate of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It was exactly the international community that at the start, accepted the logic and practice of tri-national rule and exclusive representation of the national parties.

How come that now, Westendorp (a well-known Social democrat) comes out with the result that give the opposition an almost identical result as in 1990 ?

Some ask themselves whether this is not a quota set up in advance, as a gift of the international community, or is it a result of a political mistake, complete misunderstanding of the political scene in Bosnia and Herzegovina and relations there ?


Source: Sarajevo weekly "Svijet’" August 30, 1998