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Thursday, September 14, 2000 Milan St. Protic, president of SDK Odbrana (Defense) and the co-president of Nova Srbija (New Serbia) I am a soldier of the great idea
Milan St. Protic was born on July 28th 1957 in Belgrade. He is a great grandson of Stojan Protic, distinguished member of Narodna radikalna stranka (People's Radical Party), long time minister and the first Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later Kingdom of Yugoslavia). He is a grandson of Dr. Milan St. Protic, chief director of National Bank of Kingdom of Yugoslavia (1931-1939). He finished high school (1976) and the Faculty of Law (1980) in Belgrade, and got his Master of Science in modern European history on University of California in Santa Barbara, USA (1982). He got the Ph.D. on the same university in 1987, and later worked as an assistant of Department of History and a visiting professor. He was director of Center for Serbian studies (1995-1998), and since 1985 he is an associate of Balkanological Institute of SANU (Serbian academy of Arts and Science). He wrote several books. His political career includes membership on the Main board of DSS 1992-1993 (Democratic Party of Serbia, the party of Vojislav Kostunica) and Advisory board of DEPOS in 1992 (Democratic Movement of Serbia, now extinct, included Democratic Party (Zoran Djindjic) and Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO) (Vuk Draskovic)). He founded Serbian Democratic Club Odbrana in 1997 and is its president since. Since this tear he is also co-president of Nova Srbija. He is married and has two children. FS: You are from a family with a long tradition of statesmen. How did that influence your political personality and ambitions? I tried to build my life independently from my ancestors and I think I have succeeded. I never had an obligation or even encouragement to go into politics from my family. Very often I was warned that politics brought nothing good to our family. And, here I am sixth or seventh generation, and all before me either ended up in jail or had even worse experiences. But, I just happen to live in a time when man is forced to give all he's got in order to change something in the country he lives in. That was my primary motive and not the works of my ancestors. I never wanted to be in politics, but I was pushed into it by horrible state of this country and I would welcome the moment when I could go back to my work, writing books and returning to university, and not being in politics. FS: With your name often goes a stint of nationalism. How do you experience that idea since there are many wrong interpretations?
That idea has been very exploited and, literally, thrown into dirt in the last decade and today it sounds ugly when you say in Serbian of someone that he is a nationalist. I always pictured myself in the same way and that never changed, not even today. I belong to this people, know something about its past and values, something about its faults and misgivings, but I consider my duty to help this people in the same way I help my children. So, the same kind of love I have for my children and my family I have for the people I came from. The values and achievements of one FS: For your return to the party scene you chose Nova Srbija. Why is that? No one came to me so openly and sincerely as my friend Velimir Ilic and offered me to jointly lead a party that is new and relatively small. Such a friendly offer I could not refuse. But, both Nova Serbia and Savez za promene (Alliance for change, led by Zoran Djindjic) and today's Democratic opposition of Serbia (DOS), all that is one great movement for turnover of Serbia as a state that should bring better life to all of its citizens. Therefore I am the follower and the soldier of that Great Idea, and in Nova Srbija I found the best way to achieve this. Therefore I am not a party man in its usual sense, but the political life imposes some rules by itself and among those the membership in certain political organizations. But in this moment our goal and our fight is not for power, but for a better life for this country and this people. FS: You are the candidate of DOS for mayor of Belgrade. What will be your priorities if you are elected?
The Battle for Belgrade has its meaning only in overall battle for this people and this country. So, the victory in Belgrade means nothing FS: You know Vojislav Kostunica well since the time you were together in Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS). How do you judge his qualities to be the president of FRY? We had our share of differences regarding political issues in those times, but DSS and me were never in a personal conflict and that is why we parted with no hard feelings. People have the right to differ on certain issues and to part their ways on those issues, but Voja Kostunica is a rare kind of man, I would say unique in these times, and honest, righteous, consistent and without a spot on his record. Certainly he is the most deserving man to be our candidate for president of FRY and such is the response of the citizens. So, the fact that he is the absolute favorite to win the elections has its roots in all that. As far as I am concerned, we finally have an authentic noncommunist as a symbol and the leader of democratic movement in Serbia. FS: You announced you withdrawal from politics in case of defeat. What will be the acceptable victory level for you? The victory on the presidential election as primary and secondary my victory in federal and municipal elections. Only if all three of those victories are achieved, there is a chance of me staying in political life. If one of those battles is lost, I will withdraw. FS: How do you see the move of international community to allow the elections to be held in Kosovo and Metohija?
Boris Milićević
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nation can fit in into world and universal values only if national values are cleared, understood and developed and I think that those two things are not in collision unless the ideas are mixed to that extent that one doesn't know any more what is national and what is universal. By renouncing our nationalism, we will never understand the world and the world will never understand us. On the other hand that doesn't mean that we need to be in conflict and negate and renounce the values of others. Those two paths always went parallel to and intersected each other. As much as I feel as a Serb, I also feel as a part of that world or the circle of universal values I accept and which help me to understand the world I live in. I think that that has been cleared once already in our past and that we found a balance between European and national values, but the historical circumstances got us into the situation to search for that balance again and now I have to explain what that means for me. I think that Serbian national values are more of a responsibility to act and speak by certain high standards and that it doesn't give us some bigger rights than to the others. We are a part of Europe and Balkans and our historical destiny is tangled both with Europe and the Balkans. Our path in modern age was European, West-European to be precise, and all the influences we received we received from the West and not from the East. Our most schooled and valuable people in modern age sprung out of European values and I don't see why are we on the end of twentieth century, except for the devastating consequences of fifty years of communism, go back to those old issues.
without the victory in the rest of the country. Our priority is the victory of our presidential candidate Mr. Kostunica and parliamentary victory for DOS on federal elections. The victory in Belgrade will only then have its full importance and effect. Anyone who walks down the streets of this city will see both downtown and in the suburbs what is missing and what this city deserves to have. We can't make any promises of large projects, although we would like that, and therefore we will concentrate on things that can be done quickly and be most useful to city's inhabitants. Among those things is getting city transit (buses, etc.) in order, as well as parking and the rest of the city transport system, the cleanup so we don't need do dig our way out of garbage an containers, and after that we will go step by step. But, most important of all we want to establish a Belgrade government that is going to be responsible, modest and cautious with the money, and that will sincerely and honestly work in the interest of the citizens. Therefore, we want to set an example in this country that the government is not a privilege and a way to solve one's financial woes but chosen by the people to work in their favor and to be ultimately judged by them.
The international community didn't shown much in the past decade and it hampered us more than it helped. The story of international community backing up us (the opposition) is false. Democratic movement in Serbia formed independently and in the past decade we fought Milosevic and they mostly hampered us in decisive moments or stayed neutral. We got used to that. Our victory will be cleaner and sweeter because we won it ourselves. I don't even know what Kouchner wants to do in Kosovo, but we will see. I am sure that our people that stayed in Kosovo, those miserable Serbs of ours living through their worst days, if given a chance will vote against Milosevic, giving the international community additional reason to give it the status they deserve. But the relationship with international community will have to be reorganized after our victory and on the basis of interests of this people on one side and respecting the norms of international diplomacy on the other. The dignity and defense of national interests of this nation will never be disregarded, but we will by all means try to represent our people in such fashion that it is recognized and respected by the whole world.
