| Statute "does not satisfy ambitions" |
| 10 November 2009 | 09:25
| Source:
Beta |
NOVI SAD --
An ethnic Hungarian party leader says that the expected adoption of the Vojvodina statute will "help move the boundaries" of its autonomy.
However, SVM's Ištvan Pastor added, "it does not even closely satisfy" his party's ambitions.
"We are still in favor of autonomy for Vojvodina which means legislative, executive and court power. But it must also be said there is no partner in Belgrade, even in those circles that speak all the time about decentralization, regionalization, European integrations," he told Novi Sad daily Dnevnik.
Pastor believes that the "battle for the statute" was not fought in Novi Sad or the Executive Council of Vojvodina, but in Belgrade, and that it took 13 months to make a decision within the ruling Democrats (DS).
"A large number of people in DS are no different than the Radicals or the Progressives when it comes to the way they see the arrangement of Serbia. They too advocate Serbia as a strictly centralized country where all the decision are made in Belgrade," he said.
According to Pastor, the past ten years at the Executive Council of Vojvodina convinced him that the provincial administration is much more efficient, rational and quicker to make "appropriate decisions" than when those issues were being dealt by "someone in Belgrade".
The draft statute and law on the transfer of powers to the northern province will be debated by MPs in the Serbian parliament.
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