Serbian ‘Insajder’ Journalists Face Threats from Hooligans

Brankica Stanković, the celebrated journalist who heads the Serbian broadcaster B92′s flagship documentary strand ‘Insajder’, has claimed she has received death threats after her most recent broadcast.
Insider is the most respected investigative programme in the country and has just revisited the football clubs of Serbia after an investigation into football and the mafia back in February 2008. This programme concentrated on the hooligans who have gone unpunished for past violent crimes.

The implication is that hooligans, connected to those with a great deal of money within the clubs, are able to break the law without punishment.

One such incident was the murder of the Toulouse fan Brice Taton in September. Taton was stabbed in a bar on the day of the match.

Stanković listed the crimes with which the ‘ultras’ have been charged, yet have never faced prison. Other crimes of which they have been accused include involvement in the higher echelons of drug trafficking rings.  The Minister for the Interior, Ivica Dačić, has claimed the police have done everything necessary to protect Stanković, nonetheless Veran Matić, CEO of B92 has called for more to be done to protect Serbia’s journalists.

The hooligans have been making their presence more and more obvious since the riots after the declaration of Kosovan independence, a visitor to Belgrade nowadays should expect to see all manner of unpleasant graffiti campaigns in support of hooligans or against homosexuality. The newspaper BLIC printed this comic strip back in October.

I was in Serbia in July filming my MA on Serbian journalism and the new media law which threatened to stifle investigative reporting, so some claimed.  Several journalists I spoke to told me they feared Insider could not be made after the new law was put in place. Clearly those fears have not yet been justified, and the programme continues as determinedly as ever.

Below are links to the two parts of my MA, focussing on the new media law and the challenges to quality journalism in Serbia, watch it, you know you want to:

Part One

Part Two

As part of the MA I had the pleasure of interviewing Veran Matić.

He told me about the goals behind ‘Insajder’ (Translation by Danijela Čorić)

“B92 has several investigative journalism programs. Insider is one of them and it addresses the toughest and the most dangerous issues. The topics for ‘Insajder’ are sometimes worked on for more than a year. The concept of ‘Insajder’ is connected to the most important issues, like the misuses and breeches of duty which most of the time come from inside the government itself. So in most cases the government is the problem here. If you have misuse of power or a breach of duty, somebody allowed it to happen. We are trying to assign equal amounts of criticism resulting from these programs. It is not just about stocking drug dealers or mafia bosses, but also the government which often tolerates these illegal behaviors, and in many cases encourages it with corruption and connections to members of certain mafia and ‘tajkun’ (oligarch) groups. Insider destroys taboos, vividly and with lots of evidence… There are of course many more interesting themes for Insajder [in the future].”  [Interview from 18th July 2009].

Now please watch the film.

Balkan League Could Show the Way for Eastern European Football

a gallic Shrug of acceptance?

**BEWARE: THIS BLOG CONTAINS GRAUITOUS USE OF YOUTUBE MONTAGES**

The UEFA President Michel Platini’s visit last week to Belgrade culminated in a press conference where the erstwhile attacking midfielder spoke positively about the possibility of a pan-balkan league which would hark back to the good-old days of Yugoslav football.

There was a time when some of the highest quality matches, possibly in terms of the standard of football and definitely in terms of the atmosphere were played out each week in the now decaying and empty stadiums of Croatia and Serbia.

Today, however, the domestic leagues of Serbia and Croatia resemble something more like the limp Scottish Premier League, two teams dominating, and only those two teams able to draw any kind of attendance worth singing about- save for the bi-annual derby matches (Red Star vs. Partizan in Serbia, Dinamo Zagreb vs. Hajduk Split in Croatia).

Exactly how many national leagues would be invited or interested to join is as yet unclear.  Some would fear the loss of their few big teams from the national leagues would bring about these leagues’ deaths… yet the truth is it would only provide an alternative from the undead zombie competitions which stumble on at the moment.

The heyday of the Yugoslav football should have, would have come in 1992, in the European Championships remembered by most as the triumph of the outsiders, Denmark, who only qualified after Yugoslavia were ejected due to civil war which was flaring that Summer. The combined Yugoslav Squad would, had all the players been willing to take part, have been amongst the most impressive ever to play at the championships.

What follows is a  list of just some of the more famous names and where they went on to play after 1991.

Up front the Macedonian Darko Pancev, (Golden Boot winner, later of Inter Milan), would probably have started, partnered by either Mijatovic (Valencia, Real Madrid), Suker ( Top Scorer at World Cup 98, Real Madrid) or Alen Boksic (Marseille, Lazio, Juventus).

The Coach would face the challenge of squeezing into the midfield Dragan Stojkovic (Marseille), Dejan Savicevic (A.C Milan) (seen here in an x-rated interview in Croatia) , Robert Prosinecki (Real Madrid and Barcelona), Zvonimir Boban (10 years at A.C Milan), Srejko Katanec (The token Slovenian, later Stuttgart and Sampdoria) and Vladimir Jugovic (Lazio, Juventus, Atletico Madrid).

This ahead of a defence including Robert Jarni (Juventus, Real Madrid) and the greatest free kick taker of all time (apart from Juninho of Lyon), Sinisa Mihajlovic (Lazio, Inter Milan).

Yikes.

Though many of this team were young, a number of them had winning experience, having made up the core of the Red Star Belgrade team which won the European and World Club Cups in 1991.

There is no chance of that occuring again under the current system. The best players from the best clubs in Eastern Europe now leave so soon the clubs are never able to form a strong side and make any impact in continental club competitions. More strong teams means more good games, means higher attendances bringing more money. A pan balkan league would probably rival the portugese and French leagues in it’s strength.

The benefits are significant, but the risk of this proposal is perhaps greater. Scenes such as these when Partizan Belgrade travelled to Zrinjski Mostar, a team representing the Croatian half of Mostar are strongly reminiscent of the riots in 1990, when Boban made himself a Croatian hero when he flying-kicked a Yugoslav policeman and did his bit to accelerate the disintegration of Yugoslavia.

Of course Yugoslavia cannot fall apart again, though issues remain unresolved and wounds unhealed in much of Bosnia- though perhaps now the league would be as much about reconciliation and re-opening divisions. Countries united by a virtually identical language would outgrow their fractious (to say the least) past and find a common ground on which to co-operate through sport and appreciate one another once more.