Opinion
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Daily
Nebraskan
Editorial Board
University of Nebraslee-Lincoln
Jana Pedersen, Editor, 472-1766
Eric Pfanner, Editorial Page Editor
Diane Brayton, Managing Editor
Walter Gholson, Columnist
Paul Domeier, Copy Desk Chief
Brian Shellito, Cartoonist
Michael Stock, Columnist
Feud nothing new
Recognition needed for Yugoslav states
Nearly 300 people have died in Yugoslavia since June 25,
when the republic of Croatia declared independence.
Unlike events in the Soviet Union, the fighting in Yu
goslavia has not attracted banner headlines. It has been a
steady, unchanging, unsensational process, except to those
involved in it. Every day, there are reports of a broken cease
fire, renewed negotiations and deaths.
The rivalry between Serbs and Croats is nothing new. It has
roots in World War II, when Croatia was dominated by Ger
many while the republic of Serbia was controlled by the Soviet
Union.
Now, fighting between Croats and ethnic Serbs living in
Croatia goes on.
But the rift tearing the Yugoslav confederation apart runs
deeper than a mere rivalry between two feuding republics.
Americans tend to view Eastern Europe as a homogenous
bloc, composed of similar nations and peoples. It was always
the area behind the Iron Curtain, under the wing of the Soviet
Union. When the people finally got fed up with Communism,
they all erupted at once, toppling their Soviet puppet leaders.
The apparently synchronized timing of the reform move
ments may have contributed to this thinking, but the diverse
ideologies, methods and leaders of the uprisings also prove that
as many or more differences exist within Eastern Europe as in
any other area of the world.
/vna i ugosiavia, aunougn never a viaoie mcmDcr 01 me
Communist Soviet bloc, is a microcosm of Eastern Europe.
The country was formed in 1918, but the separate republics
and ethnic groups, recent events prove, still prefer to think of
themselves as Slovenes and Serbs, Croats and Macedonians.
Since the death of Yugoslavia’s only national leader, Josip
Brox Tito, in 1980, a collective presidency has been in place,
with a goal of keeping any one ethnic group or republic from
gaining too much power.
That system may have worked in the previous Eastern Bloc
climate, in which national movements stayed beneath the
surface. But in the new Eastern Europe, the Yugoslav govern
ment by committee, perhaps shackled by too many checks and
balances, has failed.
Like the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia is grappling with the
question of who controls the tools of authority and war once
central power crumbles.
But world leaders, quick to jump on the bandwagon of
Baltic self-determination, arc slow to accept an independent
Croatia or Slovenia.
And this week’s accusations that the Yugoslav army has
been aiding the Serbs in their fight against the Croats muddles
the message the Yugoslavian government sends to the outside
' world.
An unbrcachablc cease-fire will not come to Yugoslavia as
long as the army is allowed to provide “national security” to
one side at the expense of the other.
Yugoslavia needs more than cease-fires and European Com
munity advisers. It needs recognition, and acceptance, of its
fragmented state.
—E.F.P.
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-EDITORIAL POLICY
Signed staff editorials represent
the official policy of the Fall 1991
Daily Nebraskan. Policy is set by the
Daily Nebraskan Editorial Board. Its
members arc: Jana Pedersen, editor;
Eric Pfanner, editorial page editor;
Diane Brayton, managing editor;
Waller Gholson, columnist; Paul
Domeier, copy desk chief; Brian
Shellito, cartoonist; Michael ^Slock,
columnist.
Editorials do not necessarily re
flect the views of the university, its
employees, the students or the NU
Board of Regents.
Editorial columns represent the
opinion of the author.
The Daily Nebraskan’s publishers
are the regents, who established the
UNL Publications Board to super
vise the daily production of the pa
per.
According to policy set by the re
gents, responsibility for the editorial
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in the hands of its students.
■I
CHRIS POTTER
\ ■ ‘ <*■' \.
Apartheid may end in bloodshed
In a period of Iraqi invasions,
Desert S torms and Soviet coups,
other less glamorous yet equally
important world events seem margi
nalized. The slow crumbling of apart
heid, the rotten relic of racist govern
ment in South Africa, has escaped the
media’s attention at a critical junc
ture.
Apartheid will end. That racist
ideology can no longer keep the black
majority from power. The question is
whether it will end peacefully or with
large-scale violence. Ominously, two
staggering episodes have called apart
heid’s peaceful demise into question.
In early July, President Bush an
nounced that the United States would
lift economic sanctions imposed on
the South African government by the
Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act
of 1986. In the same month. South
Africa’s President F.W. de Klerk
confessed that his government had
financed secretly the Inkatha party in
an effort to destabilize the principal
party responsible for negotiations, the
African National Congress.
Removal of U.S. sanctions and the
revelation of the $700,000 payment
to Inkatha probably will lead away
from the peaceful course of reform
charted by ANC President Nelson
Mandela toward unprecedented white
on-black, whitc-on-whitc and black
on-black bloodshed.
White police will cqntinuc to sup
press black protesters and the white
zealots of the racist Afrikaner fringe
opposed to ending apartheid. Inkatha
and ANC supporters will continue to
battle. Thousands have already died
in that old feud.
Inkatha and the ANC, rival black
political parties, hold different views
on sanctions: Inkatha opposes them
while the ANC supports them.
The argument for sanctions is more
eogent. If enough economic entities
boycott or sanction South Africa, its
crippled economy would force the
while minority government to nego
tiate with the black majority for a new
democratic, non-racist government.
Inkatha Chief Mangosuthu Buthc
jezi counters that sanctions only hurt
impoverished black workers. This,
despite the fact that the Congress of
South African Trade Unions, the
paramount black labor organization,
has consistently called for sanctions.
In lightof Inkalha’s collusion with
the white minority government, Buthe
lezi’s argument against sanctions now
appears hollow. (According to The
Economist magazine, a government
official said Buthclc/.i was "very
emotional and expressed extreme
gratitude” for the South African gov
ernment’s money.)
Rather than the moderate alterna
tive to Mandela he presented himself
to be, Bulhelczi appears now to be
little more than a stooge of the white
minority government.
Clearly Buthclc/.i was correct in
asserting that sanctions hurt black
South Africans. But Mandela, the ANC
and Congress of Trade Unions cor
rectly put this economic pain in per
spectivc: A short-term economic hurt
coupled with the demise of apartheid
is preferable to long-term economic
stability coupled with enduring apart
heid. In fact, an end to apartheid
promises to improve the economic
well-being of blacks.
An end to sanctions is, as Mandela
put it, premature. When the European
Community lifted sanctions several
months ago, Mandela put it in stronger
terms: The action was racist.
After the ANC publicly renounced
an armed struggle against the govern
ment last August as a show of good
faith, sanctions were the only bar
gaining chip the ANC had in negoti
ating. Now Mandela and the ANC
have no bargaining chips, save vio
lence.
Dc Klerk has gone far in removing
some of the more superficial aspects
of apartheid. He has released many
dissidents from jail and allowed press
censorship to ease.
But a new constitution still has not
been drafted. Blacks still cannot vote.
Government funding to Inkalha is a
decidedly poor show of good faith.
If the South African government
decides to obstruct further progress,
the ANC will be forced to resume an
armed struggle.
One hope stands out that blood
will not be shed due to the repeal of
the Anti-Apartheid Act.
According to the Investor Respon
sibility Research Center, an independ
ent non-profit corporation, most
companies that arc “avoiding South
Africa are doing so because of the
140 state and local laws... (that) will
lake far longer to repeal.” These
companies “will be looking for politi
cal and economic stability,” two fea
tures South Africa currently lacks.
Historians of the 21st century will
look back on the last years of the 20th
as the decade of the demise of com
munism and apartheid. Communism
has gone out with relatively little . I
bloodshed. Apartheid may go out with
considerably more.
Potter Is a senior physics, philosophy,
math and history major and a Daily Nebras
kan columnist
