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Central Europe: THE DOUBLE LIFE OF VISEGRAD
by Aureliusz Marek Pedziwol

At one point, Czechoslovakia came to the idea of a ‘triple’ cooperation, an idea of cooperation among Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary, three countries with similar past and problems. Among other reasons, the idea arose from the lessons learned from historical experience: Hitler's expansion was made easier due to the inability of these three Central European countries to develop stronger relations after World War I. After 1989, many people also still did not believe in the possibility of such cooperation. There were many skeptics saying that these three countries, with fragile democratic systems, without experience, and with many problems confronting them would concentrate only on their own countries and not be able to agree on anything, much less on “coordination” on their road to Europe, and thus there would be no possible benefit from the agreement.

But Vaclav Havel, then president of Czechoslovakia, wrote in 1991 (in his book Summer Thoughts) that such skepticism proved wrong: “Cooperation among the three [countries] turned out to make some sense and they are starting to realize, as Svatopluk said, that if three are working together, you can achieve more than if everyone did things on his own.” Human memory is fragile, however. Four years later, in the summer of 1995, I had to remind then-Czech Prime Minister Vaclav Klaus of Havel's words after Klaus wrote an article stating that Czech republic was skeptical towards the so-called Visegrad group and the motives behind it from the very beginning.

Central European Benelux

The history of the three-country group officially began on February 15, 1991 in Visegrad, a town in northern Hungary. Presidents Vaclav Havel and Lech Walesa of Czechoslovakia and Poland as well as Hungarian Prime Minister Jozsef Antal met there to sign a declaration about cooperation of their three countries. In fact, this Central European "troika" had met for the first time a year earlier in Bratislava. Poland was still represented by General Wojciech Jaruzelski were it not for him the Visegrad Group would have been called by Bratislava instead.

The group’s meetings were always organized at the highest level. In Visegrad, the heads of states, governments, and foreign ministries participated. A year later in Prague, the foreign ministers of the Visegrad group met with the so-called European troika (the current, former, and future presidents of the European Council) as well as with the representative of the head of the European Commission, Frans Andriessen.

The Visegrad Triangle was an excellent example of good relations in Central Europe at a time of a huge success — the disbanding of the Warsaw Pact. But Europe needed Visegrad as a breath of fresh air also at a time when it could not deal with the issue of the Balkans.

Already, on June 25, 1991, Slovenia and Croatia had proclaimed their independence and Belgrade had begun its military intervention. Slovenia left the conflict quickly without heavy casualties, but Croatia had less success. As Antal, Havel, and Walesa were signing a new declaration on intensifying cooperation between their countries on October 6 in Krakow, Vukovar in Eastern Slavonia was already surrounded. It fell on November 18. And when the same three statesmen met in Prague on May 6, 1992, the siege of Sarajevo had already been going on for a month. At the time, the Visegrad group was called — with a certain dose of exaggeration — the Benelux of Central and Eastern Europe. Few people heard bells over Prague announcing the death of the Visgerad group. For it to die, Czechoslovakia had to die, too.

In June 1992, parliamentary elections were held in Czechoslovakia resulting in two completely different political parties holding power in the federation’s two republics. While a majority of citizens were in favor of a joint country, they did not feel so strongly as to defend it to the end.

So, when the election winners Vaclav Klaus and Vladimir Meciar concluded that they could not rule together, voters did not protest. On December 31, 1992, the final Czechoslovak hour passed and while many Czechs and Slovaks could be seen crying, they did not demonstratively complain and they were calmed with promises that the two new countries would establish relations among themselves on a level above all international standards. Shocked by the wars in former Yugoslavia, Europe was enthusiastic about Czechoslovakia’s “velvet divorce.”

The Czech Republic achieved the status of best student among the countries in the region. The West liked the ability shown by Vaclav Klaus, first as Czechoslovakia’s minister of finance and later as prime minister of the Czech Republic, in implementing reforms. The Czech Republic had negligent inflation, especially compared to Poland, an unusually low unemployment rate, and social peace, without strikes or demonstrations. In addition, the Czechs happened on a stroke of genius, coupon, or voucher, privatization, which turned millions of agricultural and industrial workers into shareholders. The Czech prime minister did not have any doubts that his country was the best NATO and EU candidate. Visegrad cooperation seemed an unneeded burden and obstacle and so the Czech Republic became a “skeptic towards the so-called Visegrad group.” Meciar’s Slovakia was also skeptic, especially because of the issue of its significant Hungarian minority.

Visegrad in Sleep Mode

No one has officially buried the Visegrad group, but it remains calmly in sleep mode. There were still various ministerial meetings, but cooperation became more and more strained and less important. After awhile, the Czechs started sending their deputy ministers to such meetings. The highest level was completely forgotten. Country presidents met every year, butg in another, much wider circle, while prime ministers saw each other only at the regular conferences of SECI. For the Czech prime minister, a much more important group was CEFTA, the Central European Free Trade Association, founded in December 1992 in Krakow. This initiative was his own idea, while the Visegrad group was created by Vaclav Havel.

In regard to foreign and defense policy, regional cooperation was replaced by bilateral relations (especially when the ruling politicians in the Czech Republic understood that NATO would not expand without Poland). But for the fact that the Czech economic miracle deteriorated, that is where matters would have remained. The Czech economy came to a standstill, hit by recession, and together with corruption scandals and stories about secret bank accounts in Switzerland, caused the fall of Klaus' government. In new elections in June 1998, the Social Democrats, headed by Milos Zeman, emerged as victors. A few months later, at the end of September, Vladimir Meciar lost power in Slovakia. While his party won a plurality in parliamentary elections, the majority of seats were held by HSLS opponents and these former opposition parties formed a coalition government on October 30, headed by Mikulas Dzurinda. Already a few days earlier, on October 21, the prime ministers of the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary decided to revive Visegrad cooperation. Nothing prevented its revival except for Slovakia’s presidential elections. Meciar's run for head of state was so disturbing to Slovakia’s neighbors that they decided not to wait and Jerzy Buzek, Viktor Orban, and Milos Zeman — the prime ministers of Poland, Hungary, and Czech Republic — came to Bratislava to proclaim together with Mikulas Dzurinda second birth of Visegrad group. “Visegrad was revived in Bratislava,” wrote the Slovakian correspondent of the Prague daily Mlada fronta Dnes. Such optimism followed numerous more pessimistic predictions appearing in the paper beforehand, including by its specialist for Central Europe, Lubos Palata.

Visegrad Revival?

“And yet it is not a hopeless move if we step the way indicated by Hungarian prime minister Orban,” wrote Palata, “so that we can feel Visegrad in our own lives. For example, for Czech students to be able to study in Warsaw or Bratislava instead of the West and vice versa. Or that the organization of Days of Polish Culture in Prague becomes more important than a similar manifestation in Paris. Or maybe that at least state-owned TV and radio stations have their permanent correspondents in countries of their Visegrad neighbours.”

The situation regarding media, however, is a complete contrast to what [Palata] finds desirable. The Polish state-owned media do not have any centers in their neighboring Visegrad countries, nor any official correspondent. They only occasionally hire provisional journalists. The situation is almost the same with the print media. The only exception is Rzeczpospolita, which has correspondents in Prague and Bratislava. Even Gazeta Wyborcza shut down its Central European correspondent center in Prague.

Polish viewers, listeners or readers rarely have the opportunity to find out what is happening south. They also cannot buy newspapers of their Visegrad neighbors. Only in Bratislava can one buy the Czech press. In Prague you would look for Slovakian newspapers in vain. There is no Polish press. There is a similar situation is in Warsaw, where one can buy various foreign press, but not Czech or Slovak newspapers, not to mention Hungarian. You can watch Polish TV programs in Egyptian hotels, but it is impossible in Prague or Bratislava. There is almost no exchange in cable TV.

Still, in spite of everything, the renewed Visegrad has come closer to the common people. In June 2000, in the town of Stirina near Prague, prime ministers decided to start an International Visegrad Fund and to invest one million euros each year in order to finance joint cultural projects. The need for the fund can be seen by visiting the website www.visegradfund.org, where there is a list of grants totaling 2 million euros for various festivals, exhibitions, schools, workshops, etc.

Or a Swan’s Song

But was it all just a swan's song? A predictable commotion among the people who already use various Visegrad funds or are planning to use them has emerged following word that the group was shattered once again.

So little was needed to break it - only a statement from the Hungarian prime minister uttered at the Forum of the European Parliament. In his speech, Viktor Orban expressed opposition to the decrees of post-war Czechoslovak President Eduard Benes, which equated all Hungarians living in Czechoslovakia during WWII with being traitors. Milos Zeman and Mikulas Dzurinda immediately cancelled their participation at Visegrad meeting in Budapest. A little later, a meeting of Visegrad culture ministers in Sopron was cancelled.
Is the Visegrad group at its end once again? The answer will be seen in the next few months, with the calming down of election passions in the Czech Republic, where elections were held in June, and in Slovakia where elections will be held in autumn. After elections, perhaps there will be an opportunity for normal conversation and cooperation.
It is also possible that the idea of the Central European Benelux will have to be rethought and only what has been built from the bottom-up should count, like the theatre festival “Na granicy” (On the border) held in Polish Cieszyn and Czech Tesin, or the Polish-Czech-Slovak Movie Summer in Terlicko near Ostrava, or the Visegrad Festival in Wroclaw, Olomouc, Presev, and Pesc.

• • •

Latvia: ONCE MORE INTO THE BREACH
by Pauls Raudseps

Being a Latvian politician is not easy. By all rights, the parties making up the present government should be feeling fairly confident in the run-up to the parliamentary elections set for October 5. After all, the economy is booming: GDP grew 6.8 percent in 2000, 7.6 percent in 2001, and, despite the slow-down in the world economy, is set to grow at about a 5 percent rate this year. Latvia, along with the other Baltic States, has quite surprisingly become one of the front runners to join NATO at the Prague summit in November, laying to rest the fear, always at the back of Latvians’ minds, of being drawn once again into the Russian sphere of influence. The country's chances of being invited to join the European Union at the Copenhagen summit in December look equally good. And the present government has presented a model of stability. With a parliamentary system that almost guarantees unstable coalition governments, the present cabinet, led by Prime Minister Andris Berzins, has already set a record for longevity, remaining in office for over two years.

It is difficult to imagine what more a politician could offer to the voters, but the electorate is looking for a change. In what has become a pattern for Latvian elections, each new campaign is the signal for the appearance for some new political party promising sweeping change. In 1995, with Latvia mired in a recession and a banking crisis, a slew of right- and left-wing populists came within one vote in Parliament of forming a government. All of those parties have since disintegrated, and none managed to get re-elected in the next elections. But by 1998 a new “great white hope” had appeared in the shape of the Tautas Partija (People's Party), led by businessman turned politician Andris Skele, who promised to shake up the cozy political elite with a dose of plain-spoken, hard-nosed pragmatism. His People's Party got the largest number of votes, but not enough to take control of Parliament, and over the last four years Skele’s party has realigned itself with the powers-that-be.

The Latvian electorate is now ready for a new knight in shining armor. This time around the new party promising to change everything is led by Einars Repse, the former President of the Bank of Latvia. As father of the Latvian currency, the lats, a symbol of independence, stability and financial probity, as well as someone generally considered free from the taint of corruption, Repše has consistently been among the most popular figures in Latvian public life, and his party Jaunais laiks (The New Age) shot to the top of the public opinion polls even before it had been officially founded. In terms of economic policy Repse is very much a man of the right, promising a radical market-based overhaul of the education and health-care systems, policies which most of the population do not agree with. Surprisingly, that probably would not hurt him, because his appeal among the voters is based almost exclusively on his character and reputation. With a wide-spread sense that the Latvian political system is too responsive to the interests of a few influential businessmen and that the politicians, when they are not corrupt themselves, are doing too little to root out corruption in the judiciary, the police, and customs, Repse’s all-out rhetorical assault on the “ruling elite” and his promises of honest government have proven popular. He is sure to get the largest number of votes in the elections.

A second headache for the governing parties is the left-wing coalition of parties with the unwieldy moniker Par cilvektiesibam vienota Latvija (For Human Rights in a United Latvia). This heterogeneous amalgam of reformed and unreformed communists, joined by a smattering of former independence activists, is united by their desire to become the sole political representatives of the so-called “Russian-speaking population” in Latvia. Their close ties with Moscow make them unacceptable partners for most of the other Latvian parties, but thanks to a politically savvy coalition with the social democrats in the City Council of Latvia's capital city Riga, they have been slowly legitimizing themselves as an acceptable main-stream party and as a result have seen their popularity rise. They also seem to be trying to expand their support by reaching out to ethnic Latvians, which means that, in all likelihood, ethnic issues will not be a dominating issue in this year's elections. [. . .] As a result, FHRUL has a good chance of doing better than it did in the last elections, when it got 14 percent of the vote.

So where does that leave the ruling right-wing coalition of Prime Minister Berzins’ Latvijas cels (Latvia's Way), Skele's People's Party, and Tevzemei un Brivibai (For Fatherland and Freedom)? They certainly will not do as well as in the last elections, when these three parties got a combined 53 percent of the vote. This time they will do well to get half that, and FFF, the main Latvian nationalist party, is actually in danger of not getting the 5 percent threshold for parliamentary representation due to its mismanagement of the health care system and the waning importance of ethnic issues among the Latvian electorate. Nevertheless, in spite of the country's anti-establishment mood, all three parties are experienced political survivors and at least LW and PP are sure to be important players in the next Parliament.

As for the rest of the field, it would, perhaps, tax the patience of the reader overmuch to go into detail about the four or five parties that have about a fifty-fifty chance of getting over the 5 percent barrier. The Social Democrats have had a politically disastrous year running the Riga City Council, during which time they have been not only inept, but also politically outmaneuvered both by their partners from the FHRUL as well as by their opponents on the right. Nevertheless, because of their visibility and name-recognition, they probably have the best chance of any of the second-tier parties of getting in to parliament. As for the rest — the coalition of Christian parties calling itself Pirma partija (the First Party), the coalition of the Greens and the Farmers Union, and the splinter Socialdemocratic Union — they have a little more than three months to try to grab the attention of the voters and hope that some of the larger parties falter.

As we all know, a week, let alone three months, can be a long time in politics. In the last elections Latvia's Way pulled itself out of a mid-summer's hole, where it was flirting with the fatal 5 percent cut off point in the polls, to come back and take second place in the elections with 18 percent of the vote. But even allowing for potential shifts between the main players and a possible surprise from one of the smaller parties, the one certainty about the elections seems to be that, bucking the Easter European trend, right wing parties will once again have a majority in the next parliament. If nothing else, Mr. Repse will see to that.