Vojvodina wants president

If Vojvodina manages to get its own govermant, president, ministers, etc..., mark my word that five years from now it will become an Independent state. I wish Vojvodina good luck hope to gain Independence.

The headline of this article is misleading. A more appropriate headline would be two small political parties want Vojvodina to have a president.

The two parties mentioned received a combinded total of slightly less than 20% of the vote at the last Vojvodina election in 2004.

These two parties should run of this platform at the next election and if they get more than half the seats then they can impliment the proposal and if not then they would have failed to convince the Vojvodina population of its worthiness. That is what democracy is all about.

Ahmet Isufi, Vojvodina already has in effect what the two parties are asking for but under different names. No political party supports independence for the province and the last available opinion poll shows that support for indepence running at a whopping 5%. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_Vojvodina

This is something I have pointed out on these comments pages many times.

Sorry Ahmet:
This has more to do with certain individuals personal ambitions wanting govt titles and local power rather than ethnic strife or independence movements. You won't be able to foment much anti Serbian propaganda on this topic.

These parties are total hypocrites. They call for decentralization of Serbia but at the same time advocate centralization of Vojvodina (read the proposals they made a few days ago).

Ahmet,

Then you know nothing about policy. All you know is right on Kosovo's selfdetermination, you learn that as a parrot and repeating it constatly. However, did ever cross to your mind that autonomy is kind of decentralisation and that Serbia has the plans to decentralise Serbia so that its region develops from its funds. Guess you have no idea what does it mean. As for Vojvodina indepndence, seem that Albanians dreaming much about this scenario forgeting the huge fact that Serbs make vast majority in Vojvodina. The another thing is that is very tastless to compare Vojvodina people and their manners with Albanians and thier manners in context of gaining the goals. Vojvodina will get its status of autonomy having own government and president and that is how it should be. The only thing that I would like them to do when representing Vojvodina aborad, is to represent Serbia and its possibilities as well.

Ahmet Isufi you think its going to be independent its over 70% serbs and the only one that talks that is the hungarians and they have maybey 200,000 there and there is 1,700,000 serbs there in 07 so think what you want but it will never happen so go to albania and talk your talk...

They already have a presidnet. He is chosen by the assembly of Vojvodina.

B92 moderators,
How was the above comment constructive, enlightening, or even funny in any possible sense, worth enuf for you to publish it?

I really cannot understand how a Serbian province wants self-rule within a Serbian state. It makes no sense to me. Is there some kind of discrimination towards "Vojvodinars" or "Vojvodinians" by Serbia?

Peter,

You seem to know a lot about your Russian friends but very little about Vojvodina.
Before Milosevic both Vojvodina and Kosovo functioned as autonomous provinces because of their ethnic composition. Milosevic greatly changed that and centralized. The current constitution and government never fully restored the extent of the previous autonomy of Vojvodina. Most ethnic groups would simply like to have there what they used to have under Tito.
To understand it imagine the following scenario: Imagine that instead of some 10-12 million Germans Poland expulsed much less. In that case in some parts of current Western Poland there would be a sizable German population wishing to have some kind of autonomy. If Poland would act like many democratic countries, like Italy or Finland it would have no problem with that principle. It is naturally a hypothesis scenario because most of them were expuled. I met many of them in Germany, where I worked for few years. Some of them had long Polish names and excellent technical skills. Keeping them would definitely have helped post-war Poland to develop faster and reach a much higher living standard.

Joe,

"Before Milosevic both Vojvodina and Kosovo functioned as autonomous provinces because of their ethnic composition. Milosevic greatly changed that and centralized. The current constitution and government never fully restored the extent of the previous autonomy of Vojvodina. Most ethnic groups would simply like to have there what they used to have under Tito."

The link that I posted in comment number 2 shows that only a third of the people of Vojvodina would like to return to autonomy as it was in 1974.

Also I cannot see any relevance in the Germans in Poland analogy you are trying to explain.

Joe

"You seem to know a lot about your Russian friends but very little about Vojvodina. "

What do you have against Russians Joe?

"Before Milosevic both Vojvodina and Kosovo functioned as autonomous provinces because of their ethnic composition. Milosevic greatly changed that and centralized. The current constitution and government never fully restored the extent of the previous autonomy of Vojvodina. Most ethnic groups would simply like to have there what they used to have under Tito. "

I know the history of the status of these two provinces during the Yugoslav era, but to compare them in terms of ethnic composition is wrong, considering that Kosovo is mostly Albanian (92%), while Vojvodina is mostly Serbian (65%). Kosovo wanting self-rule is logical, Serbs in Vojvodina wanting self-rue from Serbia? Not logical.

"To understand it imagine the following scenario: Imagine that instead of some 10-12 million Germans Poland expulsed much less. In that case in some parts of current Western Poland there would be a sizable German population wishing to have some kind of autonomy."

Had the Germans not been expelled they would have made up over a third of the population. There is no such minority of that size in Vojvodina enough to warrant self-rule from Serbia, be it numerical or proportional.

"If Poland would act like many democratic countries, like Italy or Finland it would have no problem with that principle. It is naturally a hypothesis scenario because most of them were expuled."

Italy and Finland were both Axis countries, Poland was an Allied country. Axis lost the war, Allies won the war, Axis citizens were the ones usually expelled from Allies countries, so I say you have provided a poor comparison.

"I met many of them in Germany, where I worked for few years. Some of them had long Polish names and excellent technical skills. Keeping them would definitely have helped post-war Poland to develop faster and reach a much higher living standard."

I think Poland managed to develop itself fairly well considering that its infrastructure was annihilated during the war and Germany did not pay us any war reparations (they had enough to rebuild in their own country after WW2).

To conclude Joe, I understand what you are trying to explain, but your analogy is different in all areas.

Peter,

Your explanation of "Axis lost the war, Allies won the war" does not make sense in the case of Italy-Austria and Finland-Suede.
Italy was axis country almost until the end of the war. Anyway Italy did not expel the German speaking people of South Tirol "a la polonaise" but gave them wide autonomy, dign of a democratic country.
In case of Finland (axis country)the Fins gave wide autonomy to the Suedish population of the Aland Islands. In both cases it was not the kind of "pretty Polish treatement".
What do I have against your Russian friends? Well they did terrible things against none Slavs in history. One example from many: they hardly "liberated" a corner of Eastern Hungary when they took some 200,000 Hungarian civilians (men aged between 18 and 60 years) to Russia to the infamous "malenkij robot". Most of them never returned. The purpose was to kill them. This by the so-called "liberators".
And finally about the annihilated infrastructure in Poland. The valuable industrial infrastructure was really part of Germany (Schlesien) until the end of war. You got it as a present from your uncle Joe Stalin. Sure you lost poor agricultural areas in the East with large Belorussian and Ukranian populations but you came out ahead of the game by gaining those developed German territories. Without them your living standard would have matched that of Rumania.

Absolutely not! Who do these guys think they are? Serbia cannot let anyone, including "Hungarian Separatists" to dictate the future of Serbia or the policy of the state. Serbia must make clear to the Serbian population in Vojvodina that no one will never beat them again, ever. And from that point, things will surely get clearer...

Does anyone recall those days? I do!

Joe

"Italy was axis country almost until the end of the war. Anyway Italy did not expel the German speaking people of South Tirol "a la polonaise" but gave them wide autonomy, dign of a democratic country."

The Germans did not kill 1.8 million ethnic Italians and 3 million Jews in Italy, nor did they have the intention to Germanize, enslave or expel Italians from Italy (fair enough, they wanted to kill the Jews there too). Not a good comparison from you.

"In case of Finland (axis country)the Fins gave wide autonomy to the Suedish population of the Aland Islands."

Swedes were neutral in the war and also did nothing wrong to the Finns. Once again, not a good comparison from you.

"In both cases it was not the kind of "pretty Polish treatement". "

Ethnic Germans were not only expelled from Poland, but also from Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union, Netherlands and France. The only reason for the numbers I simply because there were more of them to the East than to the West of Germany.

"What do I have against your Russian friends? Well they did terrible things against none Slavs in history. One example from many: they hardly "liberated" a corner of Eastern Hungary when they took some 200,000 Hungarian civilians (men aged between 18 and 60 years) to Russia to the infamous "malenkij robot". Most of them never returned. The purpose was to kill them. This by the so-called "liberators". "

I don't know if you know, but it was non only non-Slavs (Germans, Hungarians, Baltic peoples etc.) that were sent to the gulags after WW2, but also millions of Slavs, such as Poles, Ukrainians and Russians. They were sent to the camps by the Soviet Communists. To blame this on the Russians is pure ignorance, since they suffered more under communism than anyone else. BTW Stalin was Georgian and a lot of his government was ethnically diverse, not just Russian. Get over living in the past, it's narrow-minded thinking.

"And finally about the annihilated infrastructure in Poland. The valuable industrial infrastructure was really part of Germany (Schlesien) until the end of war. You got it as a present from your uncle Joe Stalin. Sure you lost poor agricultural areas in the East with large Belorussian and Ukranian populations but you came out ahead of the game by gaining those developed German territories. Without them your living standard would have matched that of Rumania."

Once again, incorrect. Poland's economy is mostly based on services (65% of the economy), while industry makes up no more than 30%. Yes, lots of Poland's industry is located in the Województwo Dolnoœl¹skie (Lower Silesian Voivodship), but definitely not all of it, there are also huge industrial centers around £ódŸ and Nowa Huta (near Kraków). I can say with certainty that the industry around the ex-German regions does not contribute more than 10% of Poland's entire economy. To say that without them, Poland would be no richer than Romania shows you know very little about Poland's economy, not that I expect you to, unless you want to talk Poland's economy with a Pole, then research more.

------------------------------

By the way Joe, I can't help but notice that you have an issue with Slavs through your latest posts. Could it be that you support Kosovo independence because they too were oppressed by the Slavs?

It would be funny to see Serbian nationalists shrieking loud at this proposal at the same time that they defend to detah the “autonomy and right to exist” of Republika Srpska in Bonsia…

Joe, according to you the Russians did terrible things against the non Slavs.

So who then liberated Auschwitz.
The allied planes flew over that area many times, but it took the Russians to do something about it.
If it wasn't for the Russians Europe would still be under Germany.
The Russians lost 20 million people in WW2. For what? So that you can now accuse them of some sort of genocide against the non Slavs?

Please take your hatred of Slavs away from this discussion.

If Vojvodina manages to get its own govermant, president, ministers, etc..., mark my word that five years from now it will become an Independent state. I wish Vojvodina good luck hope to gain Independence.

Ahmet Isufi you think its going to be independent its over 70% serbs and the only one that talks that is the hungarians and they have maybey 200,000 there and there is 1,700,000 serbs there in 07 so think what you want but it will never happen so go to albania and talk your talk...

Ahmet,

Then you know nothing about policy. All you know is right on Kosovo's selfdetermination, you learn that as a parrot and repeating it constatly. However, did ever cross to your mind that autonomy is kind of decentralisation and that Serbia has the plans to decentralise Serbia so that its region develops from its funds. Guess you have no idea what does it mean. As for Vojvodina indepndence, seem that Albanians dreaming much about this scenario forgeting the huge fact that Serbs make vast majority in Vojvodina. The another thing is that is very tastless to compare Vojvodina people and their manners with Albanians and thier manners in context of gaining the goals. Vojvodina will get its status of autonomy having own government and president and that is how it should be. The only thing that I would like them to do when representing Vojvodina aborad, is to represent Serbia and its possibilities as well.

Sorry Ahmet:
This has more to do with certain individuals personal ambitions wanting govt titles and local power rather than ethnic strife or independence movements. You won't be able to foment much anti Serbian propaganda on this topic.

I really cannot understand how a Serbian province wants self-rule within a Serbian state. It makes no sense to me. Is there some kind of discrimination towards "Vojvodinars" or "Vojvodinians" by Serbia?

Peter,

You seem to know a lot about your Russian friends but very little about Vojvodina.
Before Milosevic both Vojvodina and Kosovo functioned as autonomous provinces because of their ethnic composition. Milosevic greatly changed that and centralized. The current constitution and government never fully restored the extent of the previous autonomy of Vojvodina. Most ethnic groups would simply like to have there what they used to have under Tito.
To understand it imagine the following scenario: Imagine that instead of some 10-12 million Germans Poland expulsed much less. In that case in some parts of current Western Poland there would be a sizable German population wishing to have some kind of autonomy. If Poland would act like many democratic countries, like Italy or Finland it would have no problem with that principle. It is naturally a hypothesis scenario because most of them were expuled. I met many of them in Germany, where I worked for few years. Some of them had long Polish names and excellent technical skills. Keeping them would definitely have helped post-war Poland to develop faster and reach a much higher living standard.

The headline of this article is misleading. A more appropriate headline would be two small political parties want Vojvodina to have a president.

The two parties mentioned received a combinded total of slightly less than 20% of the vote at the last Vojvodina election in 2004.

These two parties should run of this platform at the next election and if they get more than half the seats then they can impliment the proposal and if not then they would have failed to convince the Vojvodina population of its worthiness. That is what democracy is all about.

Ahmet Isufi, Vojvodina already has in effect what the two parties are asking for but under different names. No political party supports independence for the province and the last available opinion poll shows that support for indepence running at a whopping 5%. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_Vojvodina

This is something I have pointed out on these comments pages many times.

B92 moderators,
How was the above comment constructive, enlightening, or even funny in any possible sense, worth enuf for you to publish it?

They already have a presidnet. He is chosen by the assembly of Vojvodina.

These parties are total hypocrites. They call for decentralization of Serbia but at the same time advocate centralization of Vojvodina (read the proposals they made a few days ago).

Joe,

"Before Milosevic both Vojvodina and Kosovo functioned as autonomous provinces because of their ethnic composition. Milosevic greatly changed that and centralized. The current constitution and government never fully restored the extent of the previous autonomy of Vojvodina. Most ethnic groups would simply like to have there what they used to have under Tito."

The link that I posted in comment number 2 shows that only a third of the people of Vojvodina would like to return to autonomy as it was in 1974.

Also I cannot see any relevance in the Germans in Poland analogy you are trying to explain.

Joe

"You seem to know a lot about your Russian friends but very little about Vojvodina. "

What do you have against Russians Joe?

"Before Milosevic both Vojvodina and Kosovo functioned as autonomous provinces because of their ethnic composition. Milosevic greatly changed that and centralized. The current constitution and government never fully restored the extent of the previous autonomy of Vojvodina. Most ethnic groups would simply like to have there what they used to have under Tito. "

I know the history of the status of these two provinces during the Yugoslav era, but to compare them in terms of ethnic composition is wrong, considering that Kosovo is mostly Albanian (92%), while Vojvodina is mostly Serbian (65%). Kosovo wanting self-rule is logical, Serbs in Vojvodina wanting self-rue from Serbia? Not logical.

"To understand it imagine the following scenario: Imagine that instead of some 10-12 million Germans Poland expulsed much less. In that case in some parts of current Western Poland there would be a sizable German population wishing to have some kind of autonomy."

Had the Germans not been expelled they would have made up over a third of the population. There is no such minority of that size in Vojvodina enough to warrant self-rule from Serbia, be it numerical or proportional.

"If Poland would act like many democratic countries, like Italy or Finland it would have no problem with that principle. It is naturally a hypothesis scenario because most of them were expuled."

Italy and Finland were both Axis countries, Poland was an Allied country. Axis lost the war, Allies won the war, Axis citizens were the ones usually expelled from Allies countries, so I say you have provided a poor comparison.

"I met many of them in Germany, where I worked for few years. Some of them had long Polish names and excellent technical skills. Keeping them would definitely have helped post-war Poland to develop faster and reach a much higher living standard."

I think Poland managed to develop itself fairly well considering that its infrastructure was annihilated during the war and Germany did not pay us any war reparations (they had enough to rebuild in their own country after WW2).

To conclude Joe, I understand what you are trying to explain, but your analogy is different in all areas.

Peter,

Your explanation of "Axis lost the war, Allies won the war" does not make sense in the case of Italy-Austria and Finland-Suede.
Italy was axis country almost until the end of the war. Anyway Italy did not expel the German speaking people of South Tirol "a la polonaise" but gave them wide autonomy, dign of a democratic country.
In case of Finland (axis country)the Fins gave wide autonomy to the Suedish population of the Aland Islands. In both cases it was not the kind of "pretty Polish treatement".
What do I have against your Russian friends? Well they did terrible things against none Slavs in history. One example from many: they hardly "liberated" a corner of Eastern Hungary when they took some 200,000 Hungarian civilians (men aged between 18 and 60 years) to Russia to the infamous "malenkij robot". Most of them never returned. The purpose was to kill them. This by the so-called "liberators".
And finally about the annihilated infrastructure in Poland. The valuable industrial infrastructure was really part of Germany (Schlesien) until the end of war. You got it as a present from your uncle Joe Stalin. Sure you lost poor agricultural areas in the East with large Belorussian and Ukranian populations but you came out ahead of the game by gaining those developed German territories. Without them your living standard would have matched that of Rumania.

Absolutely not! Who do these guys think they are? Serbia cannot let anyone, including "Hungarian Separatists" to dictate the future of Serbia or the policy of the state. Serbia must make clear to the Serbian population in Vojvodina that no one will never beat them again, ever. And from that point, things will surely get clearer...

Does anyone recall those days? I do!

Joe

"Italy was axis country almost until the end of the war. Anyway Italy did not expel the German speaking people of South Tirol "a la polonaise" but gave them wide autonomy, dign of a democratic country."

The Germans did not kill 1.8 million ethnic Italians and 3 million Jews in Italy, nor did they have the intention to Germanize, enslave or expel Italians from Italy (fair enough, they wanted to kill the Jews there too). Not a good comparison from you.

"In case of Finland (axis country)the Fins gave wide autonomy to the Suedish population of the Aland Islands."

Swedes were neutral in the war and also did nothing wrong to the Finns. Once again, not a good comparison from you.

"In both cases it was not the kind of "pretty Polish treatement". "

Ethnic Germans were not only expelled from Poland, but also from Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union, Netherlands and France. The only reason for the numbers I simply because there were more of them to the East than to the West of Germany.

"What do I have against your Russian friends? Well they did terrible things against none Slavs in history. One example from many: they hardly "liberated" a corner of Eastern Hungary when they took some 200,000 Hungarian civilians (men aged between 18 and 60 years) to Russia to the infamous "malenkij robot". Most of them never returned. The purpose was to kill them. This by the so-called "liberators". "

I don't know if you know, but it was non only non-Slavs (Germans, Hungarians, Baltic peoples etc.) that were sent to the gulags after WW2, but also millions of Slavs, such as Poles, Ukrainians and Russians. They were sent to the camps by the Soviet Communists. To blame this on the Russians is pure ignorance, since they suffered more under communism than anyone else. BTW Stalin was Georgian and a lot of his government was ethnically diverse, not just Russian. Get over living in the past, it's narrow-minded thinking.

"And finally about the annihilated infrastructure in Poland. The valuable industrial infrastructure was really part of Germany (Schlesien) until the end of war. You got it as a present from your uncle Joe Stalin. Sure you lost poor agricultural areas in the East with large Belorussian and Ukranian populations but you came out ahead of the game by gaining those developed German territories. Without them your living standard would have matched that of Rumania."

Once again, incorrect. Poland's economy is mostly based on services (65% of the economy), while industry makes up no more than 30%. Yes, lots of Poland's industry is located in the Województwo Dolnoœl¹skie (Lower Silesian Voivodship), but definitely not all of it, there are also huge industrial centers around £ódŸ and Nowa Huta (near Kraków). I can say with certainty that the industry around the ex-German regions does not contribute more than 10% of Poland's entire economy. To say that without them, Poland would be no richer than Romania shows you know very little about Poland's economy, not that I expect you to, unless you want to talk Poland's economy with a Pole, then research more.

------------------------------

By the way Joe, I can't help but notice that you have an issue with Slavs through your latest posts. Could it be that you support Kosovo independence because they too were oppressed by the Slavs?

It would be funny to see Serbian nationalists shrieking loud at this proposal at the same time that they defend to detah the “autonomy and right to exist” of Republika Srpska in Bonsia…

Joe, according to you the Russians did terrible things against the non Slavs.

So who then liberated Auschwitz.
The allied planes flew over that area many times, but it took the Russians to do something about it.
If it wasn't for the Russians Europe would still be under Germany.
The Russians lost 20 million people in WW2. For what? So that you can now accuse them of some sort of genocide against the non Slavs?

Please take your hatred of Slavs away from this discussion.