1988.
Faculty of Law in Novi Sad, October 5, 1988, and Professor Sergej Flere is giving a lecture on his subject - sociology - in front of a full amphitheater. For us first-year students, this is also the first week at the university. Two young men from the Student Union arrive, interrupting Professor Fleure and asking him to send the students to join the "anti-bureaucratic protests" in the city center. The same one that will be called the "Yogurt Revolution" a little later. Workers from Bačka Palana and Vrbas have already arrived in Novi Sad in an organized manner and shouted slogans against the "autonomous leadership". Professor Flere refuses, saying that "this is the University", that he is not interested in politics and that "students stay at the university".
A day later the "autonomous leadership" fell, in the years that followed Professor Flere was subject to pressure at the Faculty of Law and in the end he was forced to leave Novi Sad and move to Slovenia where he still lives and works today.
I met him again a few years ago, we had coffee in the center of Novi Sad, we remembered those events and arranged for him to participate in our "Book Talk" conference, which Professor Flere did a few months later.
1992.
After a year's break, together with a group of students from the University of Novi Sad, I renewed the publishing of the student newspaper "Index", in which I edited the section "Society" a couple of years earlier. Now I was the chief editor, there were only a few of us in the editorial office, Vladislava Gordić was the editor of the "Culture" section. In the first issue, we had interviews with Zoran Đinđić, Goran Milić, Slavenka Drakulić and Nikola Koljević. The entire editorial staff was changed after the second issue was published. Officials of the Union of Students organized a round table on the 3P channel, hosted by Milorad Crnjanin. One of the participants said that he knows for sure that my father roasted an ox when HDZ won the elections in Croatia. That night, a bomb exploded under the gate of my parents' house in Bac. The large wooden Einfurt gate on our "Swabian house" was blown to pieces. Fortunately, no one was hurt.
After a month's break, we continued with the publication of the "Independent Index" with the help of Mile Isakov and the Independent Association of Journalists of Vojvodina. From "Index", "Nezavisno Index" and later "Novosad Index" the bi-weekly "Svet" was born, and from it Color Press Group.
I still live and work in Novi Sad.
2024.
After the appearance on social networks of an edited video from a stand in Dubrovnik, journalist and my friend Ana Hegediš Lalić, professor at the Faculty of Philosophy in Novi Sad Dinko Gruhonjić and activist from Belgrade Aida Ćorović became victims of insults but also serious threats, writing graffiti on the doorstep ... It culminated in a protest by "students", some of whom wore T-shirts with the image of Miroslav Ulemek Legija, convicted for organizing a murder Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic. Those "students" demanded that Dinko Gruhonjić be expelled from the Faculty of Philosophy "because of hate speech", they even kept the building of the Faculty of Philosophy under siege for several days.
36 years
What do all these events have in common? University of Novi Sad, false accusations, production on a national basis, threats and physical attacks.
How much has Europe and the world changed in these 36 years - from 1988 to 2024? We are not.
