Serbia has been in rebellion for the seventh month since the canopy of the Novi Sad railway station claimed sixteen lives.
The rebellion is not the result of a "tragedy" or an "incident" - but indications and evidence that the canopy has fallen due to stupidity, ignorance and corruption.
Since then, there have been a series of similar construction "incidents" - part of the ceiling at the Cardiology Clinic in Niš, as well as the ceiling at the Railway Station in Ćuprija, fell. Previously, a pedestrian crossing bridge near the village of Vlahovo and a part of the wall at the school in Pećinci collapsed when two girls were slightly injured.
The concrete structure of the overpass on the Požarevac-Veliko Gradište expressway collapsed, ceilings fell in schools in Užice and Saranov near Rača, at the Institute for Public Health in Kragujevac and near the "Maja" kindergarten in New Belgrade.
By crazy luck, there was no one under those ceilings, or those who found themselves were only slightly injured.
And just below the surface…
"Everything that is happening to us and what happened is the result of skipping procedures," says Ana Ferik Ivanovic, president of the Society of Architects of Novi Sad, for the new issue of "Vremena", which will hit newsstands on Thursday (May 15).
Construction subordinated to profit, unprofessional people, often workers from abroad who cannot read planning documents... but also the absence of control - these are the main reasons, enumerates our interlocutor.
And he claims - the problem is even bigger under the surface. "Although it is often not as visible as when a canopy falls, the infrastructural systems of cities have collapsed, and when it comes to water supply, sewage, air pollution... The will of investors is imposed and this is presented as a great urban development."
What else needs to fall?
It seems that the authorities have no intention of changing anything. Moreover, "incidents" such as the collapse of the ceiling are downplayed or even covered up in the performances of officials.
"The roads are still the safest, because there is nothing to fall there, but there are holes that trucks fall into, like on the reconstructed section of the Belgrade-Nis highway the other day," Danijel Dašić, civil engineer and activist from Nis, tells us.
"An apple fell on Isaac Newton, so he understood and described gravity. What else do we need to fall in order to understand this system and write it off?"
Read the entire article "Life under the canopy" in the new issue of "Vremena" from Thursday (May 15). Or subscribe to the digital edition.
