MONTENEGRO Dialogue: How Nice and Platitudinous That Sounds

The meeting of the leaders of the old parliamentary majority, which discussed the composition of the unconstitutional 44th Government of Montenegro, led by Miodrag Lekić, ended without an agreement. Let's recall, Lekić was declared the prime minister-designate by a decision of the Parliament, referring to Article 7F of the disputed Law on the President, which transfers part of the competencies related to proposing the prime minister-designate and electing the new Government to the parliament.

Neither Western nor European partners, who visited Montenegro in the past few weeks, supported Lekić's election as prime minister-designate.

Almost identical messages were sent from all official international addresses – the Government should by no means be formed based on the unconstitutional Law on the President. However, the leaders of the old parliamentary majority did not care about the messages from the international community, claiming that an agreement on the division of portfolios would be reached very easily and that the Government would be formed by January 20th at the latest.

However, after the meeting, instead of an agreement, mutual accusations rained down, as is the usual practice.

It became clear that the negotiations would not go so smoothly when the leader of the Movement for Changes, Nebojša Medojević, presented an explicit demand to head the security sector, which would include a vice-presidential position in the Government, but without a portfolio. If his demand was not met, Medojević claimed, there would be no Government either.

Medojević made the same demand when forming Zdravko Krivokapić's government after the last parliamentary elections.

On the other hand, the Prime Minister in technical mandate, Dritan Abazović, and officials of his party claimed that the leadership of the security sector belonged to the Black on White coalition and that they were not ready for a compromise on that issue.

The day before the parliamentary majority meeting, the General Secretary of GP URA, Mileta Radovanić, reiterated that they would not give up on coordinating the security services. Whether the inability to reach an agreement on positions in the security sector critically influenced the negative outcome of the meeting is unknown.

Deputies of the Democratic Front, the Peace is Our Nation coalition, and True Montenegro came to the meeting with the signatures of support necessary to schedule an extraordinary session of parliament where a new government would be elected, while deputies of the Black on White coalition and the Socialist People's Party did not wish to sign the initiative.

"I said that the government would be serious, or it wouldn't be. Well, it won't be. Montenegro is at a crossroads between the rational and the irrational. I know this will please those who were defeated in 2020," said prime minister-designate Miodrag Lekić after the two-hour meeting.

Lekić also said that he managed to maintain his dignity, fulfilling his promise that the Government would be decided in Montenegro, without international influence. However, he added that he would not want to speculate whether the decision of the Socialist People's Party and the Black on White coalition was the result of pressure from someone in the international community.

Leaders of DF, Andrija Mandić and Milan Knežević, claiming that their political alliance showed maximum transparency in negotiations, by giving parties that barely crossed the census in the local elections in Podgorica more than they deserved, accused those who did not want to sign of taking money or being blackmailed.

As they stated, SNP, URA, and CIVIS asked to have the names of DF members who would be part of the Government on paper, and then for their party bodies to declare themselves.

The Black on White coalition and the Socialist People's Party emphasized in subsequent statements that they still do not rule out the possibility of forming a new government, but with a signed clear coalition agreement and detailed principles regarding the functioning and distribution of portfolios, and the names of potential candidates for vice-presidential positions in the Government, as well as the president of the parliament.

In the Democratic Front, after the failed meeting, the prevailing view is that they expect the presidential and parliamentary elections to be consolidated and held in the spring. According to the agreement from September, half of the ministerial positions should have gone to the Black on White coalition and the Socialist People's Party, while the other half would be divided between the Democratic Front and the Democrats.

Another attempt at dialogue by the parliamentary majority, which has long ceased to exist, has failed, and optimism and unity have once again rapidly faded. As things stand now, it seems that the country has, at least for the moment, been saved from the formation of an unconstitutional government, which, without the participation of minority and pro-Montenegrin bloc parties, would have finally wiped Montenegro off the European path.

Opposition parties, with platitudinous statements, point to wasted time, repeating calls for dialogue, the election of Constitutional Court judges, and early elections. A part of the opposition is clearly celebrating that, instead of Miodrag Lekić's unconstitutional government, we have a continuation of the country's torment by the technical prime minister Dritan Abazović and his key assistant Vladimir Joković.

We did not get the lesser of two evils, but both evils are equally harmful to the country and its dysfunctional institutions – it was just a question of which one would befall us this time – whether it would be the one where DF wanted to change the Constitution, flag, and anthem from the leading positions in the Government, or the one where Abazović and Joković would continue to push Montenegro into the Open Balkan initiative, according to Moscow's and Belgrade's design and dictate.

We got the latter, which was probably the goal of Abazović and his partners – to retain their positions and continue their mission. The road to eventual elections is long, and we will see much more in the Montenegrin political arena.

And since we are talking about dialogue, which we invoke so often, it is worth recalling a few important points that are an integral part of any well-intentioned dialogue. The purpose of dialogue is not form, but substance. Dialogue is by no means political bargaining. The goal of initiating and conducting a genuine dialogue is the desire for compromise that is in the best interest of the country and its citizens, not an outcome that is the result of conditioning by one side or the other, which enter the dialogue process solely for party or personal interests.

The outcome of the dialogue must be a solution that is in accordance with the laws and the constitutional and legal order of the state.

Everything else is just a pretense of dialogue, which we have been witnessing for years, and the country and society suffer the negative consequences.

The question arises – does anyone even believe that a dialogue based on these principles is possible in Montenegro, and does anyone believe that political actors sincerely desire a dialogue that would be based on the interests of the state and citizens, rather than on the narrow party aspirations of politicians? Dialogue is, unfortunately, a platitude that has been chewed over so many times in Montenegrin political discourse, which everyone uses when and how it suits them.

And this is not just a case in Montenegro.

We have almost the same scenario in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Dialogue is faked in order to gain time and devise new party strategies.

Politicians, for the most part, see calling for dialogue as a path to functions, positions, profits, and the easiest way to achieve their desired goal, some under the guise of defending vital state interests, and others with the undisguised intention of undermining the sovereignty of that same state.

Even some of the state-building and pro-European oriented politicians do not want to admit that by their inaction, they are bringing the countries into a stalemate, where they become easy targets and fertile ground for the escalation of war conflicts in Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Kosovo, which Moscow and Belgrade are striving for.

Be that as it may – few are those who place the well-being of the state and citizens as the primary purpose and key direction of their political action.

And precisely because there are few of them, they are almost invisible and do not get the opportunity to homogenize the civic and pro-European oriented electorate. They are hindered by both those who negotiated yesterday and part of those who negotiated earlier, failing to understand that for a serious and citizen-oriented dialogue, young individuals, untainted by scandals, are needed, whom Montenegro certainly has and who should be allowed to build a new, truly civic, secular, and more prosperous Montenegro.

However, the armchair politicians on both sides, by avoiding accepting defeat, are still not giving up their well-heated positions to young forces, and as long as this is the case – dialogue will remain a worn-out daily political platitude, and without fundamental electoral reform, for which we have only declared readiness for years, the next elections will not bring us anything new, and young forces in the pro-Montenegrin bloc will continue to suffer due to the mistakes of the party leadership, just as we saw in the example of the local elections in Podgorica.

Because there is no dialogue without taking responsibility and making changes – of a reform nature that are aimed at the well-being of the country and its citizens.

Only with these prerequisites would dialogue be substantive and real, and everything else is a farce and deception of the public, solely for the purpose of maintaining power or political survival. It is precisely because of the lack of substantive dialogue that we are where we are, relying on the help of the international community, while the fate of Montenegro, as well as Bosnia and Herzegovina, is decided by those who very easily change sides, or are open partners of Moscow and Belgrade, or do not shy away from supporting Vučić's and Putin's players.

However, some lessons are not learned in the Balkans, even after defeat, and it is always easier to resort to platitudes than to defend national interests...