PARA-POLITICAL ACTIVITY UNDER THE MASK OF THE CIVIL SECTOR – The hidden link between Citizens’ Initiatives and ProGlas!
Continuing our series of articles on the work of Citizens’ Initiatives (CI) and the increasingly visible erasure of the line between the civil sector and open political action, we have come to yet another highly controversial case – the hidden, yet evident support of Citizens’ Initiatives for the ProGlas initiative, which presents itself to the public as “civic”, while its activities and messages speak quite the opposite.
Political rhetoric without masks
Let us recall that on the very day ProGlas was officially registered as a citizens’ association, its internet domain was registered by Citizens’ Initiatives. However, neither of these two organisations has ever transparently explained the nature of their mutual relationship. The public still does not know, nor can information be found on ProGlas’s official website, about who stands behind that organisation, who finances it and on whose behalf it operates.
Unlike organisations that genuinely engage in neutral civic activism, ProGlas in its public statements and appearances openly takes political sides, using rhetoric almost identical to that of opposition parties and protest movements. It is enough to look at just a portion of their public posts: “Major changes are coming in Serbia, no one deserves such a government” (New Year message of ProGlas and SOS); “Is Vučić, with such ‘elections’, telling us he will not leave power peacefully?”; “A transitional government of public trust is the most optimal way for a peaceful exit from the crisis”; “Vučić and Dačić most responsible for violent events on the streets”; “Aleksandar Vučić’s regime has entered a phase of rule through open violence”; “The regime has lost moral right and legitimacy”; “Growing repression in Serbia”...
The key question arises: how can such positions be called neutral or civic, rather than openly political?
However, ProGlas has not limited itself only to statements. The organisation has called for blockades across Serbia, published locations of protests and actions such as “Stop, Serbia, stand with the students”, organised public forums under slogans like
“The future is not built with bloody hands”, and even published a political document entitled “Measures for the Day After”, which is a classic form of political action. Bearing all this in mind, the question arises whether this is the activity of a non-governmental organisation or a para-political movement without electoral accountability and transparent intentions.
Šolak’s media and a “civic initiative”
Particular attention is drawn to the fact that ProGlas enjoys intensive media support from outlets under the control of Dragan Šolak, which broadcast its positions without any critical distance. Well-informed observers of Serbia’s NGO scene ask whether this is a case of ideological closeness or of hidden financial and organisational links between Šolak, ProGlas and Citizens’ Initiatives.
Silence: The question of who finances ProGlas’s activities remains unanswered
Despite dozens of public forums and round tables across Serbia, serious logistics, media promotion and constant public presence, ProGlas has never disclosed who finances its activities. This circumstance, and the opaque mutual connections, open the question of whether Citizens’ Initiatives, in addition to registering ProGlas’s website, broadly supporting its initiatives and providing venues for public forums in Belgrade, also participated in financing its establishment and operations. Were donor funds of CI used for this, and which ones specifically? Is this a channel for covert financing of political activities in Serbia? Kurir has received no answers to these questions from Citizens’ Initiatives.
All of the above points to a worrying trend in Serbia: civil society organisations are increasingly acting as political actors and surrogates for traditional political parties, but without any electoral legitimacy, accountability or control! Such phenomena, however, seriously undermine the democratic process in the country and fundamentally distance Serbia from membership in the European Union, even though these very organisations are full of rhetoric about European values and “commitment to EU membership”. Yet their pockets are even fuller with money they receive for improving Serbia’s institutional capacities in the EU accession process. It is unclear by what results they can justify the awarded donations, given that they spend the received funds on political agitation and inflaming social divisions instead of achieving the goals for which the funds were granted.
The case of ProGlas and its opaque links with Citizens’ Initiatives shows how, with logistical and organisational support from these networked structures, politics is conducted from the shadows while the public is offered a story about “civic activism”. Who is pulling the strings and who is paying the bill for this kind of activity remains a secret. And it is precisely that secret which speaks most loudly about the real intentions and the European and democratic values that Citizens’ Initiatives supposedly stand for.