Exactly one year ago, the President of Republika Srpska announced the adoption of a law that would finally reveal what all those non-governmental organizations that are not financed from the budget of the citizens of Republika Srpska, but from the budgets of citizens of other countries, are doing.
After the announcement in March, the heavy parliamentary machinery was set in motion, which by September of last year had produced the Draft Law on the Special Register and Public Operations of Non-profit Organizations. This was followed by something that rather enthusiastically bears the name of public debate, so that this legislative thriller packaged as a comedy with a tragic dedication would retreat into the bowels of strategic incomprehensibility in which it was conceived as an idea, only to see the light of day these days, as part of the Proposed Work Program of the National Assembly of Republika Srpska for the first quarter of 2024.
Which for those who follow the state of affairs did not mean much, since the work programs and even the decisions of the highest legislative body of Republika Srpska should be understood more as guidelines or even recommendations, by no means as binding.
The first quarter almost expired, but not the readiness of institutions to protect us, nor the fact that it is an election year, which is always an opportunity for a good law that protects someone. So yesterday, on Friday, at the end of the working day, week, month and deadline for the legislative procedure, someone’s phone rang in the Government building – and just like that, as if from ashes, the draft law emerged from its esoteric form and became a step closer to realization.
The idea behind this law, which the President himself claims is essentially a copy of one that someone told him is in force in America, is that it should – at least on paper, if not in the minds of its ideological creators – protect Republika Srpska. For those naive enough to ask whom and from what, it should protect its institutions and citizens from anyone who acts as an agent of foreign, political or other interests. Good heavens.
A foreign law for domestic traitors. Or the law on foreign agents, as it has become established.
It’s a good idea, excellent. No, really, because what is power at all if not a group of people, rules and organizations that are there to protect us. And that we need protection is probably clear to everyone by now. Everyone is meddling, everyone is interfering in our affairs and who knows who else is not trying to impose some decisions and attitudes that are not a legitimate expression of the will of this but of some other people.
Have you forgotten just the 40 British intelligence officers who wanted to steal our elections? Or the many colored revolutions that sowed fear and trembling in the streets of our cities? If you happen to have forgotten, be happy that you have such a responsible government that remembers and thinks about it.
There is one small problem here, which I would attribute to the proverbial tendency of the public sector not to finish things completely and some innate lack of thoroughness in addressing these and issues of similar importance. The impression is created that our wise leaders, however noble their intentions, have missed some key moments that are important for sketching the draft of such an important law.
They have, therefore, dealt with foreign agents in non-profit organizations who, with due respect to foreign agencies of this kind, among which I am sure there are honest and worthy workers, represent only small fish and a kind of incompetents when it comes to the field of foreign (especially malignant) influence. Small potatoes, as they say.
They have not looked at the important players, those who have real power, capacity and resources to act from within, although their interests lie somewhere outside. I am thinking of dangerous individuals in whose hands are the levers for making decisions and who manage processes in this procedural farce of a state.
I am thinking of those people who can influence our lives and the way they unfold with their decisions, and who do not make those decisions autonomously but on orders and in the interest of people who are located somewhere outside the borders of this state.
Those who do not waste time in non-profit organizations, but who deal with organizations where serious profit is made.
Those who meet weekly with representatives of other states to consult on the most important political issues of their own and surrounding countries.
Those whose immediate family members admit to helping establish political movements and parties in other regional states in order to influence election outcomes.
Those who declare the construction of the Pelješac Bridge, or rather the construction work on access roads that should be done by a private company, a vital national interest.
Those who use their political influence to transfer the concession right for the construction of the “Trebinje1” solar power plant from a public enterprise to a private company under foreign ownership.
Those who, violating the laws of their own state, allow the devastation of forests, rivers and natural resources of their state in order to provide enough coal for electricity production for the needs of another state.
Those who, during elections in a neighboring state, in the name of all of us, without excessive need, support one candidate who then loses the elections, putting us all in an awkward position.
Those who, in the same manner, call a presidential candidate in elections in another state an “abortion in elections,” who then wins those elections and leaves us to be ashamed of the insult uttered.
From such people we need every kind of protection, not from some non-profit organizations out there. Specifically, we need a law that regulates the work of officials in the highest positions in the state apparatus who act under the influence of foreign actors, states or interests.
I can even offer an official name for such an act: Law on Agents of Foreign Political Abortion.
