Remembering 29 November, Dan Republike (Republic Day)

Every last Saturday in November, several thousand people from all across former Yugoslavia gather in Jajce to celebrate Yugoslavia’s birthday—Days of AVNOJ, an official celebration of Yugoslavia’s founding, AKA Dan republike (Republic Day).

With Larisa Kurtović and others. Three thousand comrades, a third-term mayor, and a General Major of Tito’s Guard also make an appearance.

Listen: “Happy Birthday, Yugoslavia!” (Episode #19)

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Transcript: “Happy Birthday, Yugoslavia!” (Episode #19)

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[SOUNDBITE]

[JINGLE]

PETER KORCHNAK: This is Remembering Yugoslavia, the show exploring the memory of a country that no longer exists. I’m your host Peter Korchnak.

The second Yugoslavia was founded on November 29th, 1943 in the Bosnian-Herzegovinan town of Jajce. On that day, at its second session, AVNOJ, short for Antifašističko vijeće narodnog oslobođenja Jugoslavije, or the Anti-Fascist Council for the National Liberation of Yugoslavia, the wartime umbrella of national liberation organizations, or the Partisans, proclaimed the establishment of socialist, federal Yugoslavia.

November 29th was a major patriotic holiday in socialist Yugoslavia. On this Dan republike, or the Day of the Republic, citizens enjoyed two days off work, taking trips, visiting family, organizing feasts. It was a very popular date for weddings and for pig and lamb slaughter. First-graders took their Young Pioneer oaths and schools held performances, readings, recitals, and other events. Companies awarded medals to accomplished workers, cannon salvos were shot from castles in the republican capitals, newspapers ran features, TV channels showed marathons of old films about Partisans and cartoons for kids…

The Day of the Republic went the way of the country it celebrated. Croatia was the first to abolish it, in 1990; rump Yugoslavia, comprising Serbia and Montenegro, the last, in 2002. But the holiday, or rather Yugoslavia’s birthday, is kept alive around former Yugoslavia. Foremost among these events is the Days of AVNOJ, an official commemoration organized by the Museum of the Second AVNOJ Session. Every last Saturday in November, several thousand people from all across former Yugoslavia gather in Jajce for the festivities. Except this year of course, because of the pandemic; only a small commemoration ceremony, limited to 30 socially distanced and masked people was held at the Museum.

Here to help me make sense of this phenomenon in this town in this day and age is Larisa Kurtović, a political anthropologist studying political life in the aftermath of war and socialism. She is an Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Ottawa. She is at work on the book, Future as Predicament: Bosnia-Herzegovina and Political Life After Catastrophe, informed in part by her childhood experience of living through the Siege of Sarajevo and its aftermath. Among other things, Larisa has studied commemorations of defunct socialist Yugoslav holidays and their protagonists.

[02:55]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: A lot of times, you know, these groups, obviously, traffic in a certain kind of nostalgia for the socialist period but that nostalgia wasn’t just past oriented…

[03:06]

PETER KORCHNAK: Three thousand comrades, a third-term mayor, and a General Major of Tito’s Guard also make an appearance.

[MUSICAL INTERLUDE]

Jajce, Yugoslavia’s Birthplace: The Setting of Days of AVNOJ, Yugoslavia’s Birthday

[03:18]

PETER KORCHNAK: It is impossible to understand the Days of AVNOJ event without first understanding the city where it’s held. As with everything in Bosnia and Herzegovina, it’s a bit of a complicated story.

[03:28]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: Jajce is this fairy tale-like place. It’s this town that was built on the confluence of two rivers, Pliva and Vrbas, right, and it features in its center, this beautiful waterfall. And, you know, in the background of it is a medieval fort—

[03:44]

PETER KORCHNAK: —built at the turn of the 14th century, in the course of which Jajce was the capital of the Bosnian kingdom. At the top of a pyramidal hill the citadel crowns a terraced complex of ramparts, towers and other medieval and Ottoman-era buildings. A souvenir shop up there proudly flies the flag of socialist Yugoslavia. The waterfall with the walled city in the background and the wooded hills all around is the most famous and most photographed view of Jajce.

[04:09]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: And there’s just so much history that’s laid out in this one small place. And then part of that history was obviously the fact that this was a celebrated iconic city of socialist Yugoslavia. Residents of Jajce, you know, people who are from Jajce, are very proud of the history of their hometown and the significance that it had during the medieval Bosnian kingdom and also during socialism.

So Jajce was essentially a company town. So this is common, right, throughout Bosnia, and particularly the predominance of one economic entity that’s typically a factory. So for Jajce this was Elektrobosna. This was a factory that had originally been built during the Austro Hungarian Empire, but then was expanded significantly during socialism. Elektrobosna is a ferrosillicide-producing plant, but it was basically one of these combines, so kombinat, that essentially owned all these subsidiary companies in town. So there was a department store, but the owner of the department store was Elektrobosna; there was a football team, but you know, they were also Elektrobosna. You know, most of the residents of Jajce before the war had one, at least one family member who worked for Elektrobosna, right so this was very much the foundation of the of the economy and local economy.

[05:38]

PETER KORCHNAK: At the height of its industrial power, Elektrobosna sold 25,000 tons of silicon metals, a lot of it to Western European manufacturers. It employed some 3,000 workers, in a town of 12-13 thousand, and accounted for 14 percent of socialist Bosnia’s total export sales.

[05:55]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: Jajce used to be this model socialist community that also had this tremendous symbolic power and significance in the canon of Yugoslav socialism, because it had been the birthplace of socialist Yugoslavia, it had been a kind of a regional center, it was very multi ethnic, and it had a particularly brutal experience of the war in so far that there were two different military conquests and the concomitant waves of ethnic cleansing.

[06:24]

PETER KORCHNAK: Early in the Bosnian War, nearly all Serbs fled or were expelled from the town by separate Bosniak and Croat forces. Republika Srpska army retaliated with heavy bombardment and overtook the town, forcing in turn a Bosniak and Croat exodus. Bosnian Croat forces recaptured the town in 1995, allowing Croats and later Bosniaks to return.

Along the main drag in Jajce’s old town, two 1990s war memorials stand across the street from one another: on one side, by the town’s main mosque, the memorial to Bosniaks killed in the quote unquote “armed aggression,” on the other side a memorial fountain to Croat fighters killed in the quote unquote “Homeland War.”

[07:03]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: And then the community had been sutured back together into this town in the central Bosnian Canton where Bosnian Muslims—Bosniaks—and Croats share governance. So the Central Bosnian Canton features some of these divided institutions and ethnically divided schools, ethnically segregated schools.

Except that in Jajce, the things were a bit more complicated, because there had never been a direct military confrontation between Croats and Muslims there. So, when these forms of co-governance were re-established in the aftermath of the war, the residents of Jajce often say this, that, Jajce is just not as divided as some of these other cities that have gained infamy, such as Mostar, for example.

[07:52]

PETER KORCHNAK: Like elsewhere in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the post-Dayton world ensnared Jajce in questionable privatization and economic decline.

[07:52]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: Most of Jajce’s current problems stemmed from this incredible deindustrialization, that took place really violently.

In many ways, in the aftermath of war, it has been subject to so many of these processes that have, you see everywhere else in in Bosnia, including de-industrialization, the effects of privatization of the economy.

[08:22]

PETER KORCHNAK: Elektrobosna was broken up into several subsidiaries and sold off. Its privatization and subsequent history is now a common sordid and convoluted tale. The company still exists but it’s struggling and employs a tiny fraction of its former workforce. The bottom line:

[08:37]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: Jajce experienced very much the breakup of Yugoslavia and the war as a kind of a story of its own ruination, as not just as a community, but as an economic powerhouse, and as a certain kind of a center.

So key problems in town are unemployment and disemployment.

[08:56]

PETER KORCHNAK: What’s more, between 1991 and 2013, Jajce’s population halved. In addition to the great many refugees who never returned, a great many others have left for better economic prospects abroad. Among the remaining 7,100 people in Jajce proper, Bosniaks and Croats now each comprise some 45 percent of the population.

[09:14]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: So there is a humongous diaspora that’s mostly in Scandinavia but also elsewhere in Western Europe, and some people are also in the United States and Australia. And there were a lot of empty apartments, empty houses, some that basically were being preserved for the retirement yet to come, you know, that, you know, someday these diasporan Bosnians, residents of Jajce would come back and retire. I haven’t done the research, I don’t know how many managed to realize these dreams.

People go and finish degrees sometimes in other cities in Bosnia, where there are universities, and then come back and then they have trouble finding work. And so there has been a lot of outmigration from Jajce. This is actually something that’s happening all over Bosnia. There is a lot of the socio-economic struggle, right, that I think characterizes the life of the town.

And then there are new kind of dimensions, political dimensions of everyday life as well. The state and public sector jobs have been become some of the most coveted in the, in the local context. And so a lot of people, you know, see a steady public sector job as the goldmine. The irony is that those jobs are distributed as a form of kind of political favor to members of various political parties. So this has become a clientelistic economy tied to the local political establishment. I mean, you know, it is a small community where nationalist parties have been sharing power for 20 plus years.

[10:55]

PETER KORCHNAK: At the hotel restaurant I spoke with a local business owner, let’s call her Iveta. A non-practicing Catholic, she fled Jajce during the war and spent over a decade in Norway as a refugee. She felt the urge to return to her roots and family who stayed behind or moved back. Because she is not affiliated with any political party, she constantly runs into problems with operating her business, whether it’s permits or deliveries or what have you. Her disillusion cut through the smoke of her cigarette. “Everything is divided in this country and if you refuse to play along, you won’t get a lot done,” she told me. She was considering leaving again to rejoin her children in Norway. She added, “We’re the bottom of the bottom in this country.”

[11:36]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: There was this sense that the story was much more complicated, and the socio-economics and the questions of political power were far more important than the nationalist divisions that everybody read into the town.

I think that there is a much bigger story here and that this is playing out in a particular way in this community, that is, you know, politically heterogenous. I don’t want to give you this impression that everybody in Jajce is Yugonostalgic. There are plenty of nationalists, you know, of all kinds in the community as well.

[12:09]

[MUSICAL INTERLUDE – “Odiseja” performed by KIC Pop Hor]

Days of AVNOJ and the Museum That Makes It

[12:59]

PETER KORCHNAK: It is against this backdrop that the commemorations of Yugoslavia’s founding take place.

Before 2008, smaller commemorations were co-organized by a variety of groups, particularly Partisan veteran associations, various anti-fascist groups, and what I call Tito fan clubs.

[13:15]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: Tito Memorial Societies, Društva Josip Broz Tito, emerged in the aftermath of the breakup of Yugoslavia and the end of the so-called Yugoslav wars of secession. These groups in fact, there are many of them in Bosnia, in places like Sarajevo, in Jajce, in also, some of them are defunct now, but in places like Tuzla, but also in Slovenia, and Croatia. And these groups, these networks of Tito memorial societies help organize various kinds of celebrations of what are now defunct Yugoslav socialist holidays. So, the Day of the Republic, the November 29th, obviously, the day of founding of second Yugoslavia in the town of Jajce is one of these occasions.

[14:03]

PETER KORCHNAK: In 2007 the Croatian paper Jutarnji List reported that 600 people came to the last such informal celebration. The event ended in disagreement on practical matters. Delegations from all the republics had agreed on a potluck-style celebration, but only the Slovenes held up their end of the bargain, while, the rag wrote “the others failed. So because of disagreement over food and drinks, Yugoslavia fell apart again on the eve of 29 November into several separate celebrations that lasted late into the night.” End quote.

In 2008, the newly opened Museum of the Second Session of AVNOJ took over the commemoration of Yugoslavia’s founding. The official event, called Days of AVNOJ, has been held on the last Saturday in November ever since. I attended the event last year.

The Museum stands on the right bank of the Pliva, a few hundred meters upstream from the famous waterfall. The blocky rough-hewn stone building with views of old town dates to royal Yugoslavia, when, beginning in 1935, it served as a headquarters of the local Sokol Society, a pan-Slavic exercise and sport movement. During WWII it served as a Croatian Independent State prison, which Partisans burned down and then upon their return to town in 1943 rebuilt into a cultural space just in time for the Second Session of AVNOJ.

In 1953, the Yugoslavian government established the Museum of the Second Session of AVNOJ as a principal promoter of Yugoslavia’s founding myth and a keeper of its collective memory. It was one of the most visited museums in the country, whose citizens, from school children to workers collectives to Partisan organizations, made modern pilgrimages to the site.

During the Bosnian War the building was heavily damaged and most of its exhibits looted or destroyed. Its fortunes improved in 2002 when it was declared a national monument. In 2008, the Museum of the Second Session of AVNOJ was partially renovated and re-opened on the 65th anniversary of that session and of Yugoslavia’s founding.

[15:57]

EMSADA LEKO [IN BOSNIAN; OVERDUB LINDSAY SAUVE]: We are above all a historical site, not a museum in the traditional sense because we do not have collections. Everything we have is on display. What we had disappeared during the war; only about 10 percent of objects we’d had have been returned.

[16:16]

PETER KORCHNAK: That’s Emsada Leko, the Museum’s director since 2014. We spoke at her office where a heater hummed along and the radio played poppy tunes.

When I visit before the 2019 Days of AVNOJ, I have the entire Museum to myself. In the vestibule a memorial plaque hanging above the portrait of Tito in Partisan uniform proclaims: “Representatives of all Yugoslav nations decided here on 29 November 1943 at the Second Session of AVNOJ to form a federal republic as part of a national liberation and revolutionary struggle.” AVNOJ declared post-war Yugoslavia would be “built on a democratic, federal principle” as “a community of equal peoples” comprising six equal republics.

Sunshine streaming in from windows underneath a black ceiling lends the theater-like auditorium an airy feel. I almost tiptoe so as not to disturb the reverential silence of the place. The charcoal-lacquered hardwood floor creaks as I walk between the exhibits showcasing wartime histories of each former republic and rows of chairs and benches in the middle. Flags of socialist Yugoslavia, Soviet Union, the US, and the UK cover the support pillars. Painted on the walls are slogans, “Long Live the Brotherly Red Army,” “Long Live Comrade Tito,” “Long Live Comrade Stalin,” “Long Live Our Allies, USSR, England, and Amerika,” and “Long Live Our Heroic National Liberation Armies” between portraits of Churchill, Tito, Marx, Stalin, and FDR.

Above the stage block letters proclaim SMRT FAŠIZMU – SLOBODA NARODU! [Death to Fascism – Freedom to the People!]. I resist the temptation to step over a red rope barrier and sit in the armchair whence Tito watched the proceedings in 1943. Red curtains flank the stage in whose far-right corner, a larger-than-life, gold-painted statue of Tito once stood against the back wall where two elongated flags of Yugoslavia hang around its coat of arms. A white bust of Tito dominates the front and center of the stage; here visitors line up to take photos, one arm wrapped around his shoulders, the other in a clenched-fist salute.

[18:37]

EMSADA LEKO [IN BOSNIAN; OVERDUB – LINDSAY SAUVE]: We get a lot of visitors, about 20,000 people annually, which we’ve already surpassed this year. And that’s just ticket sales. During events like Days of AVNOJ we’re open free of charge.

People come from all over. When the museum first opened most visitors who came had a nostalgic connection to Yugoslavia, to the past times, they wished to return for a while to their childhood, their youth. Nowadays more and more young people come, people born after the 90s war, elementary and high school students on excursions, mostly from Bosnia and Herzegovina, but also increasingly from Slovenia.

Of all the former republics, Slovenes visit the most, a lot of them in big groups, on organized trips. They have strong associations of anti-fascists and Partisan veterans. People from other republics come mostly on family trips or school trips.

I forget who said it, but it’s true that “those who destroyed Yugoslavia did not count on yugonostalgia.” I think this remembrance would not be as strong and as long-lasting if people were satisfied with their countries and societies after the disintegration of Yugoslavia.

[19:47]

PETER KORCHNAK: Some 5,000 people attended the re-opening of the Museum in 2008, Leko told me. The turnout at the event spawned the idea of the Museum holding Days of AVNOJ as an official annual event.

On the eve of the Days of AVNOJ festivities a new art show opens in the building’s basement which has been converted into a gallery space. I spoke with this year’s exhibit’s curator, Elma Hodžić, whom you may remember from the story about the Historical Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

[20:13]

ELMA HODŽIĆ: “We Build Tracks, the Tracks Build Us” is a project which we developed together with four students of the Academy of Fine Arts. They actually had the possibility to spend over three months in the museum collection and to see the stories of the collection, the techniques that artists used in the Second World War and in [the] post-war period to create art, and they’ve also made their own interpretation of these works of art made in that period. I think the title of the exhibition is fantastic, and it’s very giving hope in our own participation and how we can today rebuild or build infrastructure in a physical but also in the mental way. Nowadays we have a new audience and we have to ask that audience, “Do we actually build tracks together?”

[21:06]

PETER KORCHNAK: Good question, and one that both Elma and the Museum Director Emsada Leko contribute to answering in the affirmative.

While Leko has strong reservations about the political and economic situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina, she also says–

[21:18]

EMSADA LEKO: I love my job, I love this Museum. I love it because it caretakes the memory of a bright period in our history, of the national liberation struggle, of Partisans who were on the right side of history in that war–of us when we were better people than we are today.

[DELETED]

[MUSICAL INTERLUDE]

[22:38]

The Event That Is Days of AVNOJ

PETER KORCHNAK: Saturday noon, people gather for the wreath-laying ceremony at the Memorial Fountain to Fighters and Liberators of the City of Jajce. The fountain consists of three concrete pylons, nestled horizontally into striped support slabs and interconnected so as to lead water between a number of fountain bowls. The memorial sits on a platform between the city rampart and the Travnik Gatehouse. Over a pair of loudspeakers a Museum staffer calls delegations from all former republics, Bosnia’s cantons, and municipalities, comprising representatives of anti-fascist organizations, Partisan veteran associations, and Tito societies, to queue up.

One after another, in a procession that’s as solemn as it is operatic, each delegation, mostly duos and trios, step up to the monument and lay their wreaths, sprays, and bouquets where directed, arranging the printed ribbons for greatest effect. They stand in silence for a moment, salute, bow, and move along.

Large and small flags of socialist Yugoslavia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, a couple of Macedonia, a few of individual associations, and a giant red one of SKOJ, socialist Yugoslavia’s youth association, wave against above the shoulder to shoulder crowd. According to later estimates in the local media, I am one of more than 3,000 visitors attending Yugoslavia’s 76th birthday celebration.

[23:57]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: A lot of times, these groups, obviously, traffic in a certain kind of a nostalgia for the socialist period but that nostalgia wasn’t just past-oriented, it was also a means through which one could critique the newly emerging nationalist order of things.

Obviously there is a whole choreography to their activities, they’re celebrating these defunct socialist era holidays, there’s a lot of dressing up…

[24:26]

PETER KORCHNAK: I am also one of the younger people in the crowd, which skews into senior years. Amidst gray hair, dyed dos, winter coats and hats and daypacks, I see less paraphernalia than I expected but distinctly of the moment. Titovka and Young Pioneer caps with the red star; old Yugoslav pins and badges bedecking caps and hats and shirts and jackets; here and there a dusted-off Partisan uniform or a T-shirt with Tito’s likeness, a clever slogan, or the Yugoslav flag; lanyards saying “Life Was Better Under Tito;” a couple of jokers in exaggerated cosplay assemblages. And red, lots of red—scarves, hats, shirts—as many participants accessorized in the occasion-appropriate color code to mark their belonging.

Elma’s experience attending Days of AVNOJ in the past was similar though of course she, having been born in the late 1980s, is of a different generation.

[25:16]

ELMA HODŽIĆ: We don’t believe that this meeting in Jajce was important. We don’t know why 29 of November is important.

I was actually very— at the beginning of a bit afraid but then I’ve seen friends of my parents in Jajce, people that never spoke about Yugoslavia, they were there as well, they were present. I felt that I had discovered one aspect, one very nostalgic aspect of my society that I did not knew [sic] it existed.

So nowadays we do not commemorate, we more celebrate and I think that Dani AVNOJa in Jajce are actually an opportunity for people to gather from different parts of ex-Yugoslavia in order to celebrate their values, their anti-fascism.

And I think that personally they can be annoying for some citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia and Serbia nowadays because these people had very strong ideological beliefs and today’s society does not have one common story to share.

[26:29]

PETER KORCHNAK: After the ceremony at the memorial fountain wraps up, here and there, spontaneous kolo dances break out. The crowd disperses, streaming across the green metal bridge over the Pliva to the parking lot outside the Museum where a stage is bustling with final preparations.

Under the empty gaze of shelled, roofless houses sprouting For Sale signs and ivy behind a fence, Mayor Edin Hoza, who was in the 2020 municipal election re-elected for a third term, opens the program with a welcome message.

[26:57]

EDIN HOZA [IN BOSNIAN; OVERDUB – PETER KORCHNAK]: In the name of Jajce municipality and my own it is my honor to welcome all of you, who came from all corners of former Yugoslavia at Days of AVNOJ, which commemorate events we all should remember and be proud of. From this event a nice picture of Jajce will go out into the world. I hope, if God provides, we’ll meet again in better health and better cheer in future years.

[27:31]

EMSADA LEKO [IN BOSNIAN; OVERDUB – LINDSAY SAUVE]: We’re fortunate the mayor of Jajce attends the event every year to greet the visitors. It’s a big deal for him to welcome them. But we get no funds from the municipal budget, unlike other cultural and sports events in town. The municipality does cover a portion of guest performer’s fees but there isn’t enough support on the council for us.

[28:03]

[AMBIENT MUSIC – “Zemljo moja” performed by the Jajce Pensioners Choir]

[29:38]

PETER KORCHNAK: Yugoslavia-evoking musical numbers by the Jajce Pensioners Choir you just heard and the local rock group Lazy Band alternate with speeches by delegates from former Yugoslav republics, in an echo of the gathering back in 1943. They represent anti-fascist organization or Tito memorial societies, and in their addresses they all exhort Yugoslavia’s qualities and pooh-pooh today’s realities.

With just a tiny stretch of imagination, the delegates’ appearance exemplifies attitudes toward Yugoslavia in their respective countries. There is no delegate from Slovenia. The Croat in unassuming middle-aged man civvies says Yugoslavia was “the best thing that ever happened in the Balkans since humans settled it” to cheers of “Bravo!” from the crowd.

The Montenegrin wearing a bright red lipstick, red scarf, and red heels and a stylish tan coat could be going on a date, or church, or here to what she calls, “a holy place and a symbol of a better tomorrow.”

The Bosnian is a member of the diaspora in Germany, representing associations of wartime wounded from around Western Europe.

The Macedonian dons the uniform of Tito’s Guard, the ceremonial troops of the Yugoslav National Army, including an officer’s cap and a light-blue-gray overcoat with a yellow braided belt. Macedonian delegates did not make it to the Second AVNOJ Session, so he forgoes a long speech and breaks into one of the most famous patriotic and Tito-hailing Yugoslav songs, “Long Live Yugoslavia.”

[31:00]

[AMBIENT MUSIC – “Živela Jugoslavija” performed by Gorki Nikolov and the crowd at the 2019 Days of AVNOJ]

[32:48]

PETER KORCHNAK: The Serb in a mint Partisan uniform wags his finger and enunciates to rile up the crowd.

[CROWD]: “Yugoslavia! Yugoslavia!”

“Mi smo Titovi, Tito je naš!” [We Are Tito’s, Tito Is Ours].

[33:10]

PETER KORCHNAK: At the end of the program, the famous Bosnian actor, writer, and activist Josip Pejaković, financed in part by the Jajce municipality, delivers his monodrama “Država” or “Country”, part autobiographical monologue, part political-satire standup, to bursts of laughter and appreciative applause.

As the program concludes, the spectators disperse towards their busses and cars, buying last-minute Yugo souvenirs, trinkets for kids, or dried meat from vendor stands lining the way.

[33:38]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: There’s a whole material culture to it: souvenirs with images of Marshall Tito, t-shirts… Always at every single one of these events, there is at least somebody selling old antiquated books from the socialist period. And all this memorabilia, right. There’s a way one could tell so many stories through these objects and through these practices.

[34:02]

[AMBIENT MUSIC – “Druže Tito mi ti se kunemo” performed by Lazy Band]

[MUSICAL INTERLUDE]

The Meaning of Days of AVNOJ

[35:43]

PETER KORCHNAK: As I mingle through the crowd observing the festivities, I am trying to make sense of it all. Back at the Museum a panel in the exhibit on its history asks about Days of AVNOJ: “Industry of the communist heritage or escapist defense mechanism? Nostalgia or fight for (acceptable) memory? Subversive or Yugonostalgic?” Perhaps it’s all of those things.

I find my answer after the wreath laying ceremony when I meet up for coffee with members of the Josip Broz Tito Association from Velika Kladuša, a town on Bosnia and Herzegovina’s border with Croatia. The three women, perhaps in their late forties-early fifties aren’t all that interested in discussing what the organization does, what they think of Yugoslavia, the politics of today. They want to know if I’m married, if I have children, siblings, whether my parents are still alive and how their health is, and what do I think about their town which I’d passed the week before. We talk about their families, how their kids are doing at school, what time their group will head back today and what’s for dinner. Though they all know each other from their town, they rarely spend time together, what with work and family and other life’s obligations.

And in the course of the sit-down it dawns on me this is what these groups are all about. They travel to places and events connected with Yugoslavia, sure, but the point is to socialize, to catch up with one another, to take a break from everything and spend time together as a group and with their comrades from other towns across former Yugoslavia. Though holidays like the Day of the Republic may have been in service to the system, to the regime, to the ideology, they were also vehicles for the social aspect of living in Yugoslavia. A lot of people I talk to across former Yugoslavia say that, amidst the individualistic, everyone-for-themselves life of today, they miss people from other republics, they miss the fellowship that was part of the common experience in that country.

Larisa Kurtović came to the same conclusion a decade earlier. These people are—

[37:33]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: —trying to keep alive this kind of an alternative vision of togetherness. People come together from various parts of what used to be the same country to celebrate these holidays to hang out, to recognize one another as kindred souls in a sense, right. And that to me was always really, really beautiful in a very particular way.

Especially for people who are of a slightly older generation, who grew up habituated to these forms of togetherness to what are known as izleti, so, that the field trips to these celebrations, even to things like you know, Yugoslav work actions, where the youth of Yugoslavia would not just go to build railways and roads, but also to build this famous thing called Brotherhood and Unity, so to get to know, people from other parts of Yugoslavia, to perhaps fall in love, to have a fling, you know, to make lifelong friends. I think that it’s really important to recognize that part of what’s being recreated or what people are after during these celebrations is also recreating these possibilities, even though they’re much older right now and those possibilities may take different forms.

It’s political in a different kind of a sense, because one of the things that the war had done is of course, it erected these national frontiers, you know, where there used to be one country, but it also, I think, eliminated some of these possibilities for druženje—

[39:07]

PETER KORCHNAK: —which is often translated as socializing but which also carries the subtext of comity, community, and camaraderie implying intimacy that marks solidarity and fellowship among close acquaintances and friends (in fact, some native speakers translate druženje as intimacy).

[39:22]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: People got a lot busier, survival became a lot more difficult. And so when you see these kinds of organized efforts to come together, they’re also trying to revive these traditions of collective trips and field trips. I think that dimension is quite important and that it has this kind of subtle political character in so far that it points to a different way of being in the world.

A lot of people in Jajce in particular, had seen the destructive effect of ethnic nationalism and were looking for an alternative set of political orientations and narratives. This is not just Jajce this is much of former Yugoslavia, one of the forms in which, you know, opposition to ethnic nationalism took was, through a kind of return to anti-nationalist, socialist era values and ideas about what made community, what was the good life, you know, how society ought to be organized, what are the values that ought to be upheld.

[40:35]

PETER KORCHNAK: Emsada Leko, the Museum’s director, is one of the Jajce residents with this experience. She recalls Yugoslavia fondly.

[40:42]

EMSADA LEKO: People were more satisfied, happier, they socialized more. They say we lived in a totalitarian dictatorship but us young people we didn’t feel that way at all. Politics didn’t interest us, we didn’t follow it. We were free to travel anywhere, we listened to rock music, we wore the same clothes people in the West did. The living standard wasn’t high but some basic things were guaranteed, like free healthcare, free education, various opportunities for housing. Bosnia was perhaps the most satisfied Yugoslav republic, because were the most protected here.

I’m one of the people who think neoliberal capitalism isn’t good, it deprives us of solidarity, social justice, lots of other things.

[41:31]

PETER KORCHNAK: I had addressed my query to the Velika Kladuša group to its then leader Kajtez “Kajto” Sabljaković, whom a 2018 feature story in Jutarnji List described as one of “the greatest living keepers of the memory of former Yugoslavia, the most dedicated fan of the persona and works of the country’s greatest son [Tito], and a chronic nostalgic for the times that will never return.” But he was in the hospital and the Association travelled to Jajce without him for the first time in their history. Kajto died two weeks after the event; he was 64.

In addition to all the senior and middle-aged citizens, I also saw a good number of youth at Days of AVNOJ, people who have no memory, let alone lived experience, of socialist Yugoslavia. Why are they here?

[42:11]

LARISA KURTOVIĆ: There’s something really interesting in this idea that, you know, things could be different, or that we could organize the world differently, that we could base our political projects, our future making, on a different set of set of ideals and different set of ideas about about togetherness, about what matters. I see the continuing interest of younger generations precisely through that impulse.

Today in Bosnia, a particular type of nationalism is really becoming entrenched and has occupied much of, you know, the kind of lived experience. Especially young people see the contradiction between the ideology and practice, see the injustice, see the way things are not functioning as they should be. They’re seeking out alternatives. And one of these alternatives is actually rooted in a certain kind of a history that predated the war. And I don’t think that that impulse is going to go away precisely because youth who are, you know, activists in orientation, who are inspired by other leftist movements around the world, these things, are very much global. I’m not making a claim about how representative that kind of interest is, maybe it’s like something that’s on the fringes, right. But it’s definitely, you know, you see it among young leftists, the need to reckon with and investigate with curiosity about what it all means.

This imaginary is available to the new generations in various forms and anybody who’s interested in leftist politics in the region.

[43:55]

[AMBIENT MUSIC – “Računajte na nas” performed by Lazy Band]

[BACKGROUND MUSIC]

Days of AVNOJ: A Coda

[45:30]

PETER KORCHNAK: Early next morning, a Sunday, the town is deserted. At the Travnik Gate a score of red petals strewn at my feet fills me with apprehension. Then my heart sinks. At the memorial fountain a scene of carnage: most of the wreaths, sprays, and bouquets have been destroyed overnight, the remains–heads, petals, branches, ribbons, even the event poster–ripped and scattered and trampled around the site. There’s nothing left to do but collect it all on a compost pile, perhaps there it won’t be in anyone’s way. The perpetrators of this act of vandalism would never be found (if they were sought in the first place).

And so I leave Jajce in a ponderous mood. I came searching for meaning, with the preconceived notion that what the people celebrating the defunct birthday of the defunct country are doing is commemorate the prosperous and peaceful times before they became the losers of the transition to liberal economy or succumbed to retirement. I discovered they gather to be in each other’s company, to again be comrades, to hang out and socialize with people from their country, the one that no longer exists, if only for a day. And that not everyone’s happy about that.

And then, a mother of all sendoffs. On the winding, rising road to Pliva Lake, the back side of both the Welcome to Jajce and Come Again signs is tagged with the letters SFRJ, the acronym for the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Turns out I was in Yugoslavia all along.

[BACKGROUND MUSIC]

[47:05]

PETER KORCHNAK: Next on Remembering Yugoslavia.

[SONG EXCERPT]: “Walter” by Dubioza Kolektiv

PETER KORCHNAK: In a special Christmas episode, I’ll play a dozen neo-Yugoslavist or Yugoslavia-themed songs to find out why some artists celebrate that disappeared country in their music.

Tune in wherever you listen to podcasts and subscribe to make sure won’t miss out.

[OUTRO MUSIC]

[47:45]

PETER KORCHNAK: That’s all for this episode of Remembering Yugoslavia, thank you for listening. Find additional information, photos from 2019 Days of AVNOJ, and the transcript of this episode in the show notes at [Yugoblok.com/Podcasts].

Special thanks to Lindsay Sauvé.

Outro music courtesy of Robert Petrić. Additional music by KIC Pop Hor as well as Nosens, Puh, and Petar Alargić, the latter three licensed under Creative Commons.

I am Peter Korchňak.

Ćao!

Remembering Dan Republike

It is no coincidence I launched Remembering Yugoslavia on November 29th (2017).

Dan Republike in Socialist Yugoslavia

On this day in 1943 the Anti-Fascist Council for the National Liberation of Yugoslavia (Antifašističko vijeće narodnog oslobođenja Jugoslavije, AVNOJ) at its second session in Jajce declared that Yugoslavia would be “built on a democratic, federal principle” as “a community of equal nations/peoples [narod] who freely expressed their wish to live in Yugoslavia,” called Democratic Federal Yugoslavia, comprising 6 equal republics (Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, and Macedonia). Leader of the Partisan resistance, Tito was named the head of the provisional government and also elevated to the rank of Marshal on that day.

Two years later, on 29 November 1945, at AVNOJ’s next biennial session, King Petar II transferred power to Tito as the new country’s prime minister. The country thus ceased to be a monarchy and became a republic, now renamed to Federal National (People’s) Republic of Yugoslavia. The second Yugoslavia was thus born.

Throughout its subsequent history, Yugoslavia marked the anniversary as the Republic Day (Dan Republike), commemorating the 1943 event. Republic Day honored “the achievements of the partisans’ fight and glorified the basic principle of Yugoslavia’s economic and political system.” [Ninković Slavnić]

The date featured on the country’s coat of arms:

Republic Day was a major holiday in Yugoslavia:

• Citizens enjoyed two days off work, taking trips for extended weekends or to visit family and organizing parties. People made plans ahead and the question “What are you doing for 29 November?” was more important than “What are you doing for New Year’s?” [Tanjug/Mondo] Visits to relatives included preparation of foods for the winter and a feast.
• First-graders took the oath as Pioneers, “inheritors of the historic decisions made on that date in 1943 and the guarantors of their continued meaning as foundational principles of the state” in order to promote “continuity between generations” and to connect “connected children to the memory of the Partisan struggle and the creation of the state itself.” [Balkanist]. They received a blue cap (“titovka”), a red scarf, and a red Pioneer booklet. Other events were held at schools, including assemblies, academies, readings and recitals (about Tito), and performances.
• Ceremonial academies, medal award ceremonies (to individuals and collectives for their achievements), meetings of youth, honorary cannon (?) salvos, and other commemorative events were held across the country, particularly in republican capitals.
• Newspapers ran not just articles but big features on medal recipients, especially the AVNOJ award given for the contribution to the development of society, and advertisements. Visuals representations leaned toward factories, products, and chosen people, rather than geographical locations, architecture, or maps [Ninković Slavnić]
• It was a very popular date for weddings, allowing for a double celebration (and drinking). The date had to be booked months in advance.
• It was also a popular date for pig and lamb slaughter. A follow-up question about plans included “What are you going to eat: pig, lamb, or something else?”
• TV channels showed marathons of old films about Partisans and cartoons for kids.

The band Zabranjeno Pušenje included the song “Dan Republike” on their 1987 album Pozdrav iz zemlje Safari (Greetings from Safari Country; see below for the recording and lyrics), though rather than celebratory, its tone showcases the greater freedom of expression in the 1980s Yugoslavia as well as the dark humor I enjoy so much in the post-Yugoslav countries.

Dan Republike After Yugoslavia: The Pre-COVID Version

After socialist Yugoslavia dissolved in 1991/1992, Republic Day remained an official holiday only in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, where from 1997 to 2001 the day commemorated the 1945 event and where the holiday was abolished on November 14, 2002.

Judging from internet search results [11/29/2017], the day is, perhaps unsurprisingly, most commemorated in Serbia and Montenegro. This was particularly the case in 2015, the 70th anniversary of Yugoslavia’s creation.

Remembering Dan Republike in Serbia

Serbian media marks 29 November as Republic Day on an annual basis. The thrust of the coverage is along the lines of, ‘this is what and how we celebrated this day,’ listing what Yugoslavia looked like on that day and highlighting various artefacts associated with the day and the country, e.g. songs, pioneer paraphernalia, and especially pig slaughter.

Pre-2012 coverage, if any, of 29 November will require a trip to a library or individual publication archives.

2018

KAKO SMO NEKADA SLAVILI 29. NOVEMBAR Puste ulice, pioniri, druženje i SVINJOKOLJ (How we used to celebrate 29 November: Empty streets, pioneers, fellowship, and pig slaughter), Blic, 11/29/2018 [pdf]

“The holiday is almost forgotten today, and to those who were born after the 1980s it means almost nothing. However, there are still enthusiasts and Yugonostalgics who mark it, because for them it’s an association with a better more comfortable life in a large country.”

[This brought to mind the phantom limb.]

“Ivanjičani koji nikada nisu prestali da slave Dan Republike – 29.novembar,” Infoliga, 11/29/2018

Family Nešovanović from Ivanjica has never ceased to celebrate Dan republike. The family celebrates the former holiday in their dining room, with food, paraphernalia from and symbols of Yugoslavia, and guests wearing Pioneer red scarves.

Biljana Nešovanović: “In Yugoslavia, values were respected. We lived in a different way, had a more normal life. People respected each other. I never dreamed a time would come when no one knows anything. I’m glad that at least in my home I can honor the past in which I lived the best life and impart it on my children and friends. We’ll never live like we did under Tito again. On this day, we would all have had a day off, relaxed, hung out, barbecued lamb… Sadly, today people no longer have those relationships when everyone shared goodness and honesty.”

“OD VARDARA PA DO TRIGLAVA” Kako je nastala kultna pesma koju su Jugosloveni OBOŽAVALI (How the cult song the Yugoslavs adored was born), Blic

Reprints a 1980 text describing the song’s history and countrywide acceptance and popularity.

“Vlajko nema slavu, već 29. novembar: Umesto kolača drži Titovu sliku, a svaki gost minutom ćutanja odaje počast preminulim drugovima,” (Vlajko doesn’t have slava but 29 november: Instead of a cake, every guest honors dead comrades with a minute of silence),Telegraf, 11/29/2018 [pdf]

Lajkovac resident Vlajko Jevtić, instead of his family’s slava, has celebrated Dan republike on November 29 for almost five decades. The railway worker puts on his house the Yugoslavia flag and a banner with the slogan “Long live November 29.”

When guests arrive, they first hold a minute of silence to honor dead comrades. Then he sings the Yugoslav anthem “Hey Slavs,” and only then the slava feast starts. Comrade Vlajko says, “We celebrate the holiday with songs that are appropriate to the Republic Day.”

He says he’ll celebrate Dan republike as long as he is alive, while his children celebrate their family’s slava. His neighbors often see him in a ceremonial uniform.

His other “holy days” are May 4 and 25, when he goes to Tito’s grave. The YU and CPY flags also flutter on his house on May 1 and July 7, along with the banner “Workers of the world, unite!”

“Kako je izgledao svinjokolj u vreme Jugoslavije iz minuta u minut: Red rakije, red psovanja, pa red sekire (FOTO) (VIDEO),” Telegraf, 11/29/2018 [pdf]

A description of pig slaughter on Dan republike.

Contains video interview with Jurica Paden, a Croatian musician (Grupa 220, Parni valjak, Aerodrom, Azra).

• “I miss Yugoslavia like a milk tooth.”
• “[Yugo]nostalgia is a waste of now.” [referencing Eckhart Tolle’s The Power of Now] Why think about how good things were in the past when now is good? Why think about past moments in the present one? Appreciates his past experiences and the memories thereof as well as people he met. But, “I don’t have time to spend on the past. It happened, it cannot be changed. But future can be changed. So I focus on that.”

Nebojša Ozimić, “HIPNOZA ZVANA DAN REPUBLIKE,” Jugmedia, 11/29/2018 [pdf]

Do not congratulate each other for Republic Day. Respect the little country you live in and of which you are an integral part. It is what it is, but we don’t have another one in reserve.

It was a great and powerful country composed of the defeated and victorious, and that’s how she passed. Victors abandoned her first, even though she gave them the most.

As the end of November approaches, social media fills up with nostalgia about how things used to be, photos of Yugoslavia’s symbols and personal memories, and statements like “it was our enemies who separated us.”

Just remember, Serbia was the last one to celebrate November 29, in 2002.

I spent enough years in the SFRY to be able to pass judgment, but I will keep quiet. Only say the best about the deceased.

Yugoslavia was no longer needed for outside powers who made her strong and maintained her as a buffer zone between the East and the West. When the Berlin Wall fell, Yugoslavia fell. Her citizens took her apart from within, and no one is innocent of this crime.

Milan Djordjević, “Brka’s Republic Day,” Podunavlje.info, 11/29/2018 [pdf]

“The country no longer exists, but there are flags. And there is remembrance. And there are those who keep both the flags and memory.”

Zoran Branković Brka puts out the Yugoslav flag on the Parnjača building, in the name of tradition and to greet his guests. He was never a party member but was active in youth and labor “actions. “He started marking the day in 2004 after his mother died. He wanted to give back to his friends and relatives and decided to invite all to a Dan republike commemoration; more than 20 show up for the barbecue party after work. Early on, passersby would both greet and curse the display, but nowadays they are all more sympathetic. A lawyer by profession and now a taxi cab driver, he takes the day off and the flag down the next day, after all it used to be a two-day holiday.

2017

“29. novembar, Dan republike Jugoslavije: Zašto se i kako slavio ovaj praznik širom naše bivše države (FOTO) (VIDEO)” (29 November, Republic Day: Why and how this holiday was celebrated across our former country)

Notice “our country” in title. Embedded is an undated (perhaps 1950s) documentary Creating the Federation. Repeats passages of the 2015 Mondo article.

“While for some is 29 November the day when the most prosperous country in the region was formed, some view it as a victory of totalitarianism and authoritarianism.”

An uncredited exile is quoted as recalling, “We were free, we were friends, we loved our fatherland (otadžbina), maybe a little naively. We did not imagine what the future had in store for us. Scattered around the world, sometimes we remember those days, our childhood. Thanks to that former fatherland I had a happy, carefree childhood.” [Loss of Yugoslavia is like loss of childhood is like loss of Paradise. You can never go home. Core stuff of nostalgia.]

“Šta o 29. novembru misle u srcu Beograda: Da li smo tada stvarno bili bolji ljudi ili smo samo voleli da jedemo i ne radimo puno? (VIDEO)” (What people in the heart of Belgrade think about 29 November: Were we truly better people then or did we just like eating and not working much?)

“Only those remember [the holiday] who have lived in three-four countries since birth and never actually moved from the place.” Part of the holiday’s charm was preparing meat at pig slaughters for the winter holidays.
The historian Predrag Marković said, “When there is no longer a generation that celebrated [the holiday, the holiday] will disappear too, because the historical event on which it is based is contradictory, has no transgenerational value, and is not sufficient to give it more importance.

In the embedded video, a young reporter asks Belgrade residents downtown what they associate with 29 November. They point out how life was better then. “That holiday is for me now one big memory about a great era.” “[It’s] a part of our youth and means nothing to today’s generation.”

“Sećanje na Dan Republike” (Commemorating Republic Day), RTS, 11/29/2017

A video interview with the historian of the Museum of Yugoslav History Veselinka Kastratović Ristić. Says visits to the museum spike this day, with most people heading to Tito’s grave.

“DAN REPUBLIKE Beograđani jednu ulicu namerno zovu POGREŠNIM IMENOM u čast bivšeg praznika” (Republic Day: Beograd residents purposefully call one street with a wrong name to honor the former holiday) Blic, 11/29/2017

Though the Belgrade city council renamed a number of streets between 2004 and 2007, residents continue to call Despot Stefan Boulevard its old name, 29 November Street. In several places, street name signs show both names, with the old name in the Latin and the new one in the Cyrillic script; many building entrances also still carry the old name (see photos in article and a 2014 Google Street View shot below).

“Još uvek slave bivši Dan republike,” TV Subotica, 11/29/2017

Tito statue unveiled this year in Subotica at the annual commemoration ceremony, co-organized (?) by “Centar Tito Subotica” and Pokret IV Mini Jugoslavija.

“Dan republike u Subotici,” Radio Televizija Vojvodine, 11/29/2017

One Subotica resident says it was good times but it’s the past. “Plusquamperfekt,” he says.

On an empty kiosk is a banner, “Dok je nas, biće i Jugoslavije” (As long as we exist, Yugoslavia will exist too.)

2016

“U duhu bivše Juge!” (In the spirit of the former Yugo[slavia])

Photos from a new (?) tradition of commemorating the holiday: a masquerade ball with costumes and music from the socialist era.

“Kozaračko kolo na Dan Republike, najmlađi igrač ima preko 60 godina (VIDEO)” (Kozarac kolo on Republic Day, the youngest dancer is over 60)
“KAKO JE POD ZVEZDOM ŽIVEO ČOVEK KOJI SADA ŽIVI POD ORLOVIMA: Priznao nam je to na 29. novembar (VIDEO)” (How the man who today lives under the eagle lived under the star: He told us on 20 November)

Video interviewing a senior at a commemorative party. “We all lived nicely in that country. We socialized, we worked, we were active in a student union, in the party… We made friends with volunteers from other countries. I do not think there is any reason not to remember this day.

“Besplatan kupus, pasulj, pihtije i kuvana rakija: Slavimo rođendan bivše Jugoslavije 29. novembar (VIDEO)” (Free food and drinks: We are celebrating the birthday of former Yugoslavia 29 November)

13-minute video, reporting from two locations.

1. Cafe SFRY, a Yugonostalgia cafe. Owner and his friends from several former republics got together and started the nostalgic cafe. Reporters ask passersby, including a woman who was a Pioneer, a senior, and a Dutchman about their recollections of the holiday and the former country.
2. Kafana Korčagin, a communism nostalgia restaurant. Same event as 2016 pieces above.

“Dan republike nekad i sad,” RTS Stara Pazova, 11/30/2016

“29 novembar Dan republike anketa građani Zaječara,” Online TV, 11/29/2016

2015

“Za sve klince koji su propustili Dan Republike” (For all the kids who missed Republic Day), Mondo

On pig slaughter: “On that day, pigs, lambs, and swine were sacrificed to the glory of brotherhood and unity.”

“A ZA DAN REPUBLIKE – SVINJOKOLJ! Evo kako je Jugoslavija SLAVILA 29. NOVEMBAR (VIDEO)” (For Republic Day – Pig slaughter! Here’s how Yugoslavia celebrated 29 November), Telegraf

“Dan Republike: Kako se nekad slavio 29. novembar?” (Republic Day: How was 29 November celebrated in the past?) B92, 11/29/2015

An abridged version of the 2012 Mondo article (originated at Tanjug press agency) above.

2014

“Svinjokolj, a šta bi drugo za 29. novembar?” (Pig slaughter, and what else on 29 November?), Mondo, 11/29/2014 [pdf]

“Svinjokolj za bivši Dan Republike” (Pig slaughter on former Republic Day), Mondo, 11/29/2014

How various communities revived the pig slaughter tradition. Photos in the first article, video in the second.

“Da li bi nam bilo bolje da se SFRJ nije raspala” (Would it have been better had SFRY not fall apart?), Mondo, 11/29/2014 [pdf]

The remembrance of the day “remains as a reminder of a better time.” Equivalent holidays in the successor republics see nothing of the excitement that Republic Day elicited. “Perhaps it’s because the day was celebrated for so long in the country that fell apart and because many families, dreams, and lives fell apart as well. And after all that, from a historical distance, many ask where would we have been had we remained in the joint country? Would we have the living standards of Sweden? What sports trophies would we have won? What good movies would have been made and who would have been the biggest music star?”

A poll then asks the titular question: 69% voted yes, 23% voted no, and 8% did not know.

“KAKO SU SE SRBI ODREKLI TITA I JUGOSLAVIJE: 29. NOVEMBAR – Praznik kojeg više nema, kao ni republike! (FOTO) (VIDEO)” (How Serbs renounced Tito and Yugoslavia: 29 November – Holiday that no longer exists, just like the republic), Telegraf, 11/29/2014 [pdf]

2013

“Srećan vam praznik nepostojeće države” (Happy holiday of a non-existent state), Mondo

Tanjug press agency informational piece.

“DAN REPUBLIKE: Sinonim za svinjokolj, sećanje na bivšu državu i pionirske marame! (FOTO) (VIDEO)” (Republic Day: A synonym for pig slaughter, remembering the former country, and Pioneer kerchiefs”), Telegraf, 11/29/2013 [pdf]

In addition to history notes, a more detailed description of pig slaughters, which became synonymous with the holiday.

“The holiday every year marks the existence of former Yugoslavia and represents one of the best memories for all those who lived there. Unfortunately, Republic Day did not survive the bloody war which tore the apart. Only remembering remains.”

2012

“Kako se nekad slavio 29. novembar” (How 29 November used to be celebrated), Mondo, 11/29/2012 [pdf]

Claims Slovenes are the greatest Yugonostalgics, sending the most visitors to Tito’s grave in Belgrade.

In the Montenegrin town of Tivat “old fighters” and anti-fascists draw a parallel between happy times in what they call “the most beautiful country in the world” with the current political situation.

A big commemoration of the 69th anniversary was held in Jajce, attended by people from all former republics but mostly from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, and Slovenia, with a meeting, ceremony, laying of wreaths at a monument, cultural program, and socializing.

Author points out the past is not studied in equal measure in the former republics, calls the anniversary “a birthday that is no longer celebrated.”

“LEPŠA PROŠLOST: Danas je bio Dan republike!” (A better past: Today was Republic Day!), Telegraf, 11/29/2012 [pdf]

Same Tanjug article as the Mondo piece above.

2011

“Jugonostalgičari i dalje slave Dan republike,” Radio Televizija Vojvodine, 11/29/2011

Reporter: “And how is modern Serbia today? Somewhere between Yugonostalgia and Euro-skepticism. No surprise that so many people don’t accept it and live in the past. November 29 is a time to ask, what do we really want?”

Remembering Dan Republike in Montenegro

2018

“Tivat pretekao Podgoricu,” Radio Tivat, 11/29/2018 [pdf]

The General Consulate of SFRY unveiled on the Tivat waterfront a memorial to Tito, a replica of the Augustinčić statue whose original is in Kumrovec, a copy in Belgrade, and another, unveiled later, in Podgorica. The NGO also celebrated its 15th anniversary and co-sponsored (?) the “Ex-YU” party at Hotel Regent.

Tivat dobio Titov spomenik (Tivat Got a Tito Memorial), CDM, 11/29/2018 [pdf]

The memorial was sponsored by the Tivat-based nonprofit General Consulate of SFRY on the 15th anniversary of its existence. Report adopted from Boka News. See also Tivat Radio above.

“BORAČKE ORGANIZACIJE POLOŽILE VIJENCE NA SPOMEN BISTU IVANA MILUTINOVIĆA,” Dan, 11/30/2018

Commemoration in Podgorica, at the memorial to Ivan Milutinović, Hero of Yugoslavia and member of Montenegro’s delegation to the 1943 AVNOJ session.

2017

“Dan republike: Praznik kojeg se stariji sa sjetom sjećaju” (Republic Day: Holiday which elders recall fondly), Vijesti

Informational TV news piece with archival images and the Zabranjeno pušenje song in the background, interspersed with a Q&A of passersby on the streets of Podgorica the older of whom remember it fondly.

2015

“Jugoslavija u srcu” (Yugoslavia in the heart), Vijesti, 2015

Since 2000, Bijelo Polje resident Rasim Karahmetović has celebrated Republic Day with his Yugonostalgic friends, with food, drink, and songs. “We have been gathering to celebrate Republic Day, because of the love for people and the country that I still carry in my heart. I love Yugoslavia, where I had many comrades with whom I am still in contact today.”

“Regent slavi i rođendan Titove Jugoslavije”, Boka News, 11/2/2015 [pdf]

(Regent also celebrates the birthday of Tito’s Yugoslavia) – Promo of the Regent Porto Montenegro club, which for the second year running organizes “YU Night Party” on the Republic Day anniversary, featuring Yugoslavian music and drinks.

Praznik države koju smo voljeli: 29. novembar-Dan Republike (Holiday of a Country We Loved). CDM, 11/25/2015 [pdf]

Dry informative article.

2014

NVO „Generalni Konzulat SFRJ“ slavi Dan SFRJ (NGO General Consulate of SFRY Celebrates Day of SFRY), Boka News, 11/29/2014 [pdf]

In addition to celebrations in Tivat, a cultural program was held in the Kotor shopping center Kamelija, with a fashion show and performances, and across Montenegro.

Perković said the celebrations “remind us of this beautiful country, and how we used to be happy on that day.

As every year, a delegation from Montenegro attended the official commemoration in Jajce.

“Uz maršala Tita…” (With Marshal Tito)

A 21-second clip, work of an art student made for 29 November.

“Novljani obilježili Dan Republike” (Novljani [Serbian tribe] marked Republic Day), Vijesti

A youth association organized a celebration of the holiday at the popular restaurant Mali Raj (Small Paradise), attended by Novljani and representatives of WWII fighters’ association, “who remember those times with nostalgia.” They sang the YU anthem and revolutionary song. The youngsters said they initiated the occasion to “mark an important date that is historically significant for our society and whose values ​​we can apply today.” Tanja Ateljević, the owner of the restaurant, which hosted Tito and prominent Yugoslavs in its 48 years in business, said “We are preserving the tradition with the wish to again see the time when honest work, knowledge, goodness, and human solidarity will be valued.”

Since 2002, when the holiday was abolished, “Yugonostalgics mark the former holiday with various activities.”

“Proslava Dana republike u “Kameliji”” (A celebration of Republic Day at Kamelija), Vijesti

A promo of a retro Republic Day celebration at the Shopping Center Kamelija in Kotor, which invites “citizens to “bravely and decisively” march to the shopping center on Saturday, where people in period costumes will be marking the day and a male and female comrade selected.

“Shopping Center Kamelija 29. 11. 2014. DAN REPUBLIKE”

A commemoration/celebration of Dan republike at a shopping mall in Kotor. Intro song “Računajte na nas” by Djordje Balašević (estrada version feat. Balašević (1981) / Rani Mraz version (1977) / 11 yo. Katarina Radulović version (Pinkove zvezdice, a Serbian kids’ version of American Idol, 2017) lyrics).

“Dan Republike SFRJ slavi se u tivatskom hotelu “Regent”” (Republic Day to be celebrated in the Tivat hotel Regent), Vijesti

A luxury seaside hotel is holding a commemoration of the holiday, with period music and booze, to raise funds for an seriously injured town resident.

2013

“NVO “Generalni konzulat SFRJ” na proslavi Dan republike u Jajcu” (NGO ‘SFRY General Consulate’ celebrating Republic Day in Jajce), Vijesti

A nonprofit in Tivat called SFRY General Consulate, led by “the Consul” Marko Perković, organized a prayer breakfast for reporters to mark “the holiday of holidays”, the “birthday of the most beautiful and prosperous country in the world.” The 10-year old NGO will also sent a delegation to the ceremony in Jajce, where the Slovenian delegation, led by Franko Pleško, will organize a parallel ceremony full of Yugoslavism.

Perković sees the NGO as a “carrier of Yugoslavism”, which organizes many events, including a big celebration of 25 May – Youth Day, the soccer tournament Marshal Tito Cup, commemorations of the Yugoslav War Naval Day on 10 September, the JNA Day on 22 December and the Security Day on 13 May. The NGO featured in a 2005 BBC documentary “Tito’s Ghost.” The NGO will “continue to protect the interests of Yugoslavia from attempts to falsify its history.” He claims that, due to its activities, the NGO is on a government black list of nonprofits, never to receive any public funding.

2012

“Miks Titovih govora i ex-YU roka” (A mix of Tito’s speeches and ex-YU rock), Vijesti

The holiday will be celebrated at the Scottish Pub in “Titograd” (Podgorica), with period decorations, speeches, and clips.

“Dan Republike u Jajcu: “Hej Sloveni”, crvene zastave i pionirske marame” (Republic Day in Jajce: The anthem, red flags, and Pioneer kerchiefs), Vijesti

Many of the 1500 people attending the ceremony (held a few days early so it would fall on the weekend, which drew some complaints) held flags of Yugoslavia, featuring Tito’s likeness, and those of former Yugoslav republics, and sang the “Hey Slavs” anthem and partisan songs. Attendees included people with banners reading “Tito is the whole world, a world that does not recognize Tito, recognizes Hitler” and “With Tito in our heart we are inseparable and invincible” as well as anti-fascists from all former Yugoslav republics, communists, Yugonostalgics and others who came to pay homage to former Yugoslavia. Significantly fewer Montenegrins attended than in previous years. Program included laying of wreaths, speeches, music performances, and a thematic Božidar Jakac (Slovene) painting exhibit.

Boris Petković from Serbia said Yugoslavia was “a state that was respected, valued, prosperous, strong, recognized and well-known in the world. Let us not forget values ​​that the Yugoslav partisans, led by Marshal Tito, fought, died, and spilled blood for.” We were “truly naive to have allowed ourselves to be deceived and for our differences to be used against us. Instead of uniting us and making us stronger, as it should be, our differences have divided us and broke the best country in the world. But standing before you today, my heart is full and my eyes are full of tears. I see here not Serbs, Croats, Bosnians, Montenegrins, Slovenes, Macedonians—I see Yugoslavia and Yugoslavs, in one place, united in a new common struggle for what the generations before us left behind. The struggle for the creation of a new Yugoslav state.”

2011

“U Bijelom Polju se prisjetili velikih datuma iz prošlosti” (In Bijelo Polje they commemorated important dates from the past), Vijesti

Representatives of the local Savez udruženja boraca Narodnooslobodilačkog rata (SUBNOR, Association of Fighters of the National Liberation War) laid wreaths at a monument to fallen soldiers. SUBNOR President Rajko Medojević said, “This day reminds us of the times when, under the flag of the Republic, we were all equal, had education and health care, and lived that we were working and living from our work.” He also instructed the young generation to guard and follow the true values ​​”which the Republic, whose day we celebrate, left for us.”

“Jugonostalgičari u Jajcu proslavili Dan Republike” (Yugonostalgics celebrated Republic Day in Jajce), Vijesti

Jajce was flooded with people wearing red Pioneer scarves and carrying Yugoslavia’s flags. Montenegro was represented by about 30 people from SUBNOR, League of Women Antifascists, and other associations as well as by the Ambassador of Montenegro to BiH, Dragan Djurović. SUBNOR rep Boro Banovic said today he remembered “the most beautiful moments of our former homeland of Yugoslavia” and that he was proud to be Montenegrin and have “our own Montenegro.” The organizer Dr. Enes Milak was pleased to see more and more visitors (“anti-fascists”) every year.

Program included laying of wreaths , music entertainment (the evening concert featured artists from Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina; Macedonian delegations were absent from the whole event), an exhibition of photographs, lectures, and a poetry reading.

Local residents had mixed feelings about the celebration. Many disliked the fact it wasn’t on the 29th, others the sea of flags with the five-pointed star, while others still enjoyed the celebration.

Remembering Dan Republike in Bosnia and Herzegovina

There are no mentions of Republic Day in the major Bosnian media outlets online. Bosnia and Herzegovina celebrates independence day on November 25 (the Republika Srpska part on January 9), having “integrated some of the decisions underlying the original Dan Republike into its identity post-independence. November 25 was chosen as the country’s statehood day because Tito’s communists first recognized Bosnia-Herzegovina as a federal republic within Yugoslavia on that date in 1945. (Major Serb and Croat parties in Bosnia-Herzegovina object to the date and the existence of any state-wide statehood day).” [Balkanist]

Days of AVNOJ in Jajce

The AVNOJ Museum continues to operate in Jajce, Bosnia and Herzegovina, in the very same building where the Council held the 1943 session.

Since 2008—the museum was opened on 11/29/2008—on the last Saturday (weekend) in November, the Museum has been commemorating the 2nd AVNOJ session anniversary as Days of AVNJO. Anywhere from 1,000 to 2,5000 to “several thousand” people from all of Yugoslavia attend.

Museum director Emsada Leko said this about the event in 2014:

• Several thousand people gather from all parts of the former Yugoslavia. They usually come organized in groups.
• The program contents of: a solemn “academy” event with speeches and music performances, laying of flowers and wreaths at the Memorial Fountain to the Liberators of Jajce in World War II, and an opening of an exhibition at the Museum.
• Media interest is significant. Many outlets from the countries of the former Yugoslavia report on the event.

All videos in this section by Jajce Online.

2018

Announcement:

Reports:

“U Jajcu, 75 godina kasnije,” Jajce Online, 11/29/2018 [pdf]

Emsada Leko:

• “AVNOJ’s decisions resonate today. The last generations of students who learned in school about this event were born in the 1980s, and those who were born later here can begin to learn about the former country.”
• “The museum is at the center of tourism, and annually we see [20-] 30-thousand tourists. The Days of AVNOJ event has a great significance for the city in every respect.”

Section “Community is a tool for achieving success”:

• Almost everyone in Jajce says they live normally, next to each other but also together. They also reveal a secret: more mixed marriages have been recorded here over the past ten years than in the entire pre-war period.
• High school students raised their voice and said no to segregation and division in education. Nikola Sop High School students stood up against it and persisted. The youngsters walk together and spend time on the waterfalls, say that “it is wrong to teach us what distinguishes our nations. We believe that we can achieve much more together.”
• Many young people leave. One interviewee said, “We were refugees here and we are all returnees. Serbs, Croats, and Bosniaks were all expelled from their city, and now we are returning together. However, we cannot stop this new outflow. Our city is getting smaller, nearly half of the population has left.”

“Više hiljada antifašista u Jajcu obilježilo 75. godišnjicu AVNOJ-a,” Jajce Online, 11/24/2018 [pdf]

“Dolazak u Jajce najavile delegacije iz svih zemalja bivše Jugoslavije,” Jajce Online, 11/22/2018 [pdf]

More than a thousand people attended, from all former Yugoslav republics.

2017

Announcements:

• Jajce Online
• Jajce Press

“Nakaš: Dva zasjedanja AVNOJ-a među najznačajnijim datumima u bh. historiji,” Klix.ba, 11/24/2017

2016

“Harmonika, petokrake i pjesme na obilježavanju 73. godišnjice Drugog zasjedanja AVNOJ-a u Jajcu,” Klix, 11/26/2016 [pdf]

Nearly 1,000 people from all parts of former Yugoslavia attended the event.

“Harmonika, petokrake i pijesme na obiljažavanju 73. godišnice Drugog zasjedanja AVNOJ-a u Jajcu,” Bug.ba, 11/26/2018 [pdf]

Nearly 1,000 people attended. Good photo gallery.

2015

2014

Photo gallery by JU “Agencija za kulturno-povijesnu i prirodnu baštinu i razvoj turističkih potencijala grada Jajca”

“Jajce: 71. godišnjica Drugog zasjedanja AVNOJ,” Radio Slobodna Evropa, 11/24/2014

Nice photo gallery.

2013

Photo gallery by JU “Agencija za kulturno-povijesnu i prirodnu baštinu i razvoj turističkih potencijala grada Jajca”

2012

“SABNOR BiH: Centralno obilježavanje godišnjice Drugog zasjedanja AVNOJ-a u Jajcu,” 24 Info, 11/24/2012

“U Jajcu 3.000 poštovalaca AVNOJ-a,” B92, 11/24/2012

2011

Photo gallery by JU “Agencija za kulturno-povijesnu i prirodnu baštinu i razvoj turističkih potencijala grada Jajca”

2007

“Kozaračko kolo i Thompsonove budnice,” Jutarnji List (Croatian outlet), 2/12/2007 [pdf]

The last celebration before Days of AVNOJ was marked by disagreements among different former repulics’ delegations as to how to celebrate after the official commemoration ceremony, including locations and refreshments. E.g. Slovenians proposed a potluck-style celebration but were the only ones who brought food. “All the delegations should have celebrated together but because of the disagreement about food and drinks, Yugoslavia fell apart again.”

About 600 people attended, dancing during the day and partying through the night.

This was the first time representatives of the city of Jajce participated as organizers of the official part of the program, in an effort to boost tourism by adopting the anniversary as part of its brand, the way Kumrovec does with Tito’s birthplace.

For one day, Jajce nostalgically lived as the center of the former SFRY. Outside of these events, Jajce lived its normal life.

Other Parts of Bosnia

2017

“U Bihaću obilježena 75. godišnjica AVNOJ-a: Ponosni smo na našu historiju i antifašizam,” Jajce Online, 11/29/2017 [pdf]

Dževad Kardaš, secretary of SABNOR-he Unsko-Sanski Canton:

• Bosnia and Herzegovina has a future only on the condition that stops the rehabilitation of fascist ideas and movements that want to break it.
• We are pleased that this date has been marked on the highest level and that delegations of anti-fascists from all over former Yugoslavia came to this ceremony. We anti-fascists fight for civil and indivisible Bosnia and Herzegovina, which is the land of all its peoples, regardless of faith and nation, and only as such can it survive.”

Ibrahim Durmo board member of SABNOR BiH:

• Events like this show that people want to live together and do not want inter-entity divisions and demarcations.
• These manifestations stem from the people, who seek self-management, which was also the main feature of the former state, which provided the ordinary man with certain rights and opportunities. Bosnia and Herzegovina will be whatever the people want, and I think that these radical ideologies, which want to join us to Croatia and Serbia, are unsustainable and that they will soon pass because people return to this idea and in that context I believe in the survival of Bosnia and Herzegovina and its bright future.”

Hakija Abdic, President of the League of Anti-Fascists of South East Europe:

• AVNOJ is the vision of the future of Bosnia and Herzegovina, where modern Europe is trying to build its European community.
• Just as AVNOJ was important for the creation of modern Bosnia and Herzegovina, it was equally important for the emergence of all the present-day states that were created by the disintegration of the former Yugoslavia. That is why AVNOJ is our common heritage and a vision for the future. We do not have the right to give up AVNOJ because it would also give up our current state.

2016

“Dan Republike: Kako se nekad slavio 29. novembar? – 29.11.2016,” TV K3, 11/29/2016

Prijedor, Republika Srpska:

Remembering Dan Republike in Croatia

Croatia was the first republic to stop celebrating Dan Republike, in 1990. It replaced the day with its own independence day, October 8.

In Croatia, Yugoslavia continues to be scrubbed out of historic existence, particularly by the (far) right, with others coming along for fear of being accused of anti-Croatianism.

“Croatia’s official policy towards the holiday has been one of enforced amnesia, characteristic of its rejection of any symbol associated with the socialist period.” [Balkanist] Material about the day in Croatian media is, therefore, scarce.

“Zašto se nekada 29. 11. slavio Dan republike? (1943.)” (Why Was Republic Day Celebrated on 29 November in the Past?), Dnevno

Summarizes the historic events in 1943, mentions nothing of post-war Yugoslavia. Today’s Croatian Constitution calls the borders of Yugoslavia established in 1943 as “AVNOJ borders.”

Remembering Dan Republike in Slovenia

Slovenia held the first referendum on independence in Yugoslavia, on December 23, 1990, with 88 percent of Slovenes voting in favor. Yugoslavia’s wealthiest nation, Slovenes wanted to stay in Yugoslavia the least.

Twenty-plus years later, commemorations of former Yugoslavia’s birthday are absent, with only essayistic reflections dotting the media landscape. Yugoslavia, while recognized as a historical reality, seems to have been put squarely in the past here, and recognized as something not to dwell on in the fast-moving, European-Union and globalization-focused current reality. It seems the Slovenes have dealt with it in the most positive, “nationally mature” way.

2017

“Jugoslavija je crknila točno 29. novembra (2017)” (Yugoslavia crumbled on 29 November), Večer

A reflection on the day’s events in the Hague when the Croatian general Slobodan Praljak, the last convict to be sentenced at the International Court for Yugoslavia for, among other things destroying the Mostar Bridge, drank lethal poison at the sentencing hearing. “The unfortunate country was formally and literally decaying and decaying for a long time, formally and literally,” writes Marko Crnkovič, until meeting its “symbolic, typically pathetic Balkan end from spite [inat] on 29 November 2017, on its former Republic Day, precisely 74 years after its establishment…” Criticizes the reaction of the Croatian polity to the general’s suicide and asks, “Are Slovenes even aware who they have to deal with when they are clashing with profoundly traumatized Croats who cannot yet reasonably and rationally think about their recent history?”

Concludes with, “It’s really time for us to bury this goddamn Yugoslavia…. “[W]e stop to burden ourselves with trying to understand these old Croatian, Serbian, and Bosnian traumas. If we didn’t get it yet, we had already done it quite well then. (Da ne bomo še mi kaj fasali, če smo jo že takrat še kar dobro odnesli.)”

Sources

• Decisions of AVNOJ
• Decisions of AVNOJ Presidency
• “The Declaration from the Second Session of the Anti-Fascist Council of National Liberation of Yugoslavia, November 29, 1943.” Arhiv Jugoslavije / Archives of Yugoslavia
• Declaration from the 2nd Session of AVNOJ
• Jajce Attractions: AVNOJ Museum. Lonely Planet
• Lynch, Lily. “Today Is Republic Day: 70 Years of Yugoslavia.” Balkanist. 11/25/2017
• Ninković Slavnić, Danka. “Celebrating Yugoslavia: The Visual Representation of State Holidays.” In: Luthar, Breda & Maruša Pušnik, eds. Remembering Utopia: The Culture of Everyday Life in Socialist Yugoslavia. Washington, DC: New Academia Publishing, 2010.
• Sahovic, Dzenan & Dino Zulumovic. “Obsolete Cultural Heritage in Post-Conflict Environments. The Case of AVNOJ Museum in Jajce, Bosnia Herzegovina.” Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern Studies. Vol. 14 , Issue 2, 2012
• Zabranjeno pušenje. “Dan Republike.” Pozdrav iz zemlje Safari. Diskoton, 1987
• PLUS all the online news articles referenced above.

Notes

• Vijesti commemorated the day every year with coverage on November 29. All articles linked to above were online in November 2017; by November 2018, they were all deleted from the Vijesti.me website, with no redirects,  no replacements (via site search), and no Wayback Machine snapshots available.
• Some of Mondo articles are adopted from the press agency Tanjug.
• Telegraf runs a feature on Republic Day every year.