The way in which Aleksandar Stanković, aka Sale Mutavi, was killed on October 14, 2016, in the evening, at the corner of Bačvanska and Gospodara Vučić streets, is terrible. That intersection has two symbolic places - the Central Prison in Belgrade and the stadium of FK Obilić. If the allegations from the investigation are correct that two attackers shot at him from close range and that there was no chance for him to escape, it can be assumed that the last thing Stanković saw was the drawn image of Željko Ražnatović Arkan on the wall of the FK Obilić stadium that he was looking at parked car.
In recent years, Stanković has been known to some of the public as the leader of extreme Partizan fans. He was killed in a mafia manner, with his back turned towards the prison where he did not go "to serve his sentence" and his face towards the place which, on a symbolic level, is the center of everything that has happened with the fan movement in Serbia since 1989. Namely, that year Arkan " "united" fan groups from the north stand of Crvena zvezda stadium and since then they cheer their club at least on Sundays, and to the greatest extent they have become an instrumentalized group for the sake of nationalist politics, criminal activities and violence towards similar groups.
In addition to Stanković, another man who was later found to be an employee of the Ministry of Justice, Directorate for the Implementation of Prison Sanctions and a person who receives a salary from the budget of the Republic of Serbia was seriously wounded. So, a prison guard who was apparently a bodyguard for a man who was claimed to be employed as a security guard at a gym in Belgrade.
If one could ignore the criminal record of Stanković and the rumors that circulated about him in the city and the forum, it turns out that he was a young man who was waiting for his wedding with his long-term fiancee, and that he earned his living doing security work. However, it is clear that he was at least that, and the way the "state" reacted after his assassination, moved the whole event from the criminal to the political level.
First, on the evening when Stanković was killed, a police helicopter flew over Vračar and Zvezdara, which almost never happens. Then, on the morning of October 15, at an extraordinary press conference in the Palace of Serbia in New Belgrade, the reason became known: Interior Minister Nebojša Stefanović interrupted the joint bivouac of the Government of Serbia in Niš to announce to the public that Serbia has declared war on organized crime, because it will not to allow imported mafia groups "from a former Yugoslav republic" to run rampant and kill in Belgrade. And so on…
Why did the murder of a man who was at the same time the leader of a fan group and part of a criminal milieu provoke the state so much that it told everyone who deals with such things that this is a red line that will not be crossed and that a decisive reaction by the police and others will follow security authorities? It didn't sound sincere, it seemed that something else was hiding behind it. The way Stefanović spoke was strange for someone who really wants to reassure the citizens: it seemed more like they were sending some messages to people who understand that dirty language because there was no precise name, that is, as if a threat had been sent that it would not go like this again and that things have to change.
photo: stanislav božić / beta…football players…
Later that day, as well as on the following day, the Prime Minister of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, spoke on this topic in the tone of a man who is once again telling someone something: citizens should not worry because the state will win this "war" at any cost, and criminals it is better for them to return to Montenegro, where they came from, than for the Serbian "god of justice" to come to their door.
In this way, taking into account the history of the relationship between politics, sports-fans-clubs and crime, as well as the special relationship that the prime minister himself has with the stand, the murder of Stankovic became a first-class political event that will have its consequences both now and in the future.
photo: stanislav božić / beta...and Partizan basketball players in T-shirts with the image of Salet Mutavo
Over the weekend, this event resulted in the football match between Voždovac and Partizan on Saturday, as well as the basketball match between Partizan and Olimpija on Sunday, with the players of the "black and white" paying respect to the slain fan by wearing t-shirts with his image across the jerseys and a message "I remember everything well." By the way, it's a line from the well-known fan song "from the South". This one in memoriam it was also seasoned with a minute of silence before the start of the basketball game, which caused an avalanche of negatively intoned texts and comments in the public and on other
educational networks. The public has already routinely wondered how mail can be delivered to a convicted drug dealer and criminal. The administrations of both Partizan clubs remained silent, but published an obituary saying goodbye to Stanković. Aleksandar Vučić stated that he was not interested in that.
WHERE IS MUTAVI FROM?: The last three years, from the 2013/2014 season. Aleksandar Stanković was one of the leaders of the "notorious" group "Janjičari" and the most important people in one of the most important stands in Serbia - the south stand of the Partizan stadium. His enthronement coincided with the moment when his five-year prison sentence for illegal drug trafficking was upheld in the Court of Appeal, a sentence that, from today's perspective, might have saved his life.
Basically, the word around town was that a new group had appeared on the south stand of the Partizan stadium, made up of "guys" who had previously been "in the north" (Crvena zvezda fans) and that they were unstoppable. The name "Janjičari" seems to reflect their true nature and symbolically says that they have come to deal with their former friends, the Red Star fans.
That's how it looked on several occasions around the derbies played in recent seasons, but it seems - when you look back - that Stanković and his partners were brought to the Partizan stadium to do some "important things" there in the process of reconciling that stand that opposed it from the beginning Vučić with a derogatory chant; today it is most often repeated by Vučić himself - "Vučić the fag". For the most part, the leaders of Alcatraz were removed from the stand - the group that controlled it to the greatest extent for many years - and the veterans from the south said that no one should mess with Mutavi because he is dangerous and because he shoots. Of course, all this happens on the complete margins of society and has no direct connection with the lives of people in Serbia, except that the people who run the tribune have a direct connection with the people who run the country and that they are still a recruitment center for all forms of crime in Serbia. . Well, this could be of interest to citizens who have teenagers at home.
In Partizan, since 2013, there have been changes in the management of the club, because SNS cadres and people close to Aleksandar Vučić came with the desire to "help", like everyone from the ruling political parties before them. But there was something different here, since the tribune and the administration were reformed at the same time. Until the spring of this year, Stanković was the main man who "helps" the club to be led by those who were said to be the best for the club and to punish those who were judged to perhaps no longer understand what is good for Partizan: the whole Serbia was thus able to see how the security man Miloš Vazura, the director of the club, was beaten in broad daylight, at the end of April 2016, at the moment when "one current" was trying to replace another in Partizan.
In that gruesome fight, Stanković was only an observer and did not get his hands dirty - he showed his middle finger to the street camera - which then enabled him not to be prosecuted while his accomplices were sentenced to symbolic punishments. Vučić also commented on that event: when he was asked how it was possible for Stanković, the third participant in that terrible beating, to be released, he shouted at the media why arrest a man who only watched and did not hit anyone.
LIFE AND DEATH OF SALET MUTAVOG: After beating Vazura's bodyguard...
Aside from Vučić's temperament. Such a statement by a man who normally comments on everything that happens in Serbia with the authority of someone who knows things well, could lead to the conclusion that Vučić is somehow defending Stanković and that there is some connection between him and Mutavo.
VUCIC AND THE FANS: Although few people are ready to talk about things they hear nothing about at the extraordinary and regular press conferences of the Prime Minister of Serbia, it has been unequivocally shown and confirmed that Vučić has direct connections with what is happening in the two biggest Serbian clubs, Partizan and Zvezda .
When it comes to Zvezda, its incarnation in the late autumn of 2012 in the voluntary abdication of the then president Vladan Lukić, showed what was only speculated for several years: Vučić had been in the club before, probably since the spring of 2009, when Lukić took over the club that was dissolved with the wholehearted assistance of Goran Vesić and others from the Democratic Party.
Vučić was the club's liaison with the authorities at that time, specifically with Miki Rakić, which "Vreme" recently wrote about. Rakić probably wanted to control the stand through Vučić, and in return Zvezda was enabled to get a big sponsor and try to consolidate, because then it seemed that Partizan had jumped so much that Zvezda would actually be shut down. Lukić and the comrades who took over the management of the club with him for that job had to get amen from the leaders from the north of the Zvezda stadium, and there a connection was made that continues to this day.
photo: Igor Marinković...and the place of the murder
Rakić believed that Vučić would tame the fans, that he knew them "from the inside", that they could trust him more than a "democrat", that this would be the basis for the decriminalization of the stand and that it would finally stop being abused by the security forces. service and a criminal. However, something else happened that may have taken the good initial idea in the opposite direction. In short: the cases of Genoa, Jarinje, drone, Savamala...
In all these cases, publicly or secretly, the "same perpetrators" appear, but due to the sensitivity of the topic, there are no witnesses who would speak publicly about it. However, in a way, Vučić is a man who could have very good and real knowledge about all these events. The prime minister, of course, doesn't want to talk about it, but that's why he managed to use this mafia showdown, which disturbed his mini-campaign in the South of Serbia, because it distracted people's attention from the success of his rule to the horror of everyday life in Belgrade, thanks to the which was raised around "our confrontation with Montenegrin mobsters" two days before the elections in Montenegro, where "the arrest of Serbian terrorists who wanted to arrest Milo Đukanović" additionally mobilized those who may have wanted to skip another rounding of Milo's name.
In addition to Zvezda, Vučić also dealt with Partizan in recent years by seeing more of the fan leaders, someone with a management that was not to his liking, and later, with the help of his associates like Novak Nedić, he took control in Humska as well. So, in a strange way, both Zvezda and Partizan are now in a situation where they actually have the same management, that is, their "head of the board" is the same person. It is in this context that Stanković is important: with his "work" on and off the platform, he ensured that the "real people" in the administration get support, and that the platform and the streets do not wave too much against the government. For that mining job, for that thrashing on the street and in the stands, Stanković was looked down upon when it came to serving a prison sentence, and it seems that by deciding to agree to such a bargain and buying his freedom, he created problems for himself that and brought him to this end.
ADMINISTRATION, SHIRTS, RESPONSIBILITY: Before Stanković is forgotten by the media and before his image adorns a wall in a part of the city where he was particularly important, the Partizan club honored him in a way that horrified the hypocritical public in Serbia. T-shirts with his image were worn by football and basketball players last weekend, which was supposed to mean gratitude for what Stanković did for the club: several seasons in the south stand of the Partizan stadium created an obviously mythical personality out of him and, as has been mentioned several times , it's not the first time similar "fans" have been given this kind of honor. For example, Zvezda's players wore T-shirts with the inscription "Justice for Uroš" and in memory of the murdered Vladimir Dunjić - and both of them are people with criminal biographies...
However, when Alen Kostić, who for years was the head of the Prohibited, a renegade group that did not agree to "deals with the authorities and administration", was killed in August of this year, there was no commemoration except on the stand. It seems that it would be okay to commemorate someone's death in this way, especially if that someone has supported the club from the stands for years, in rain and snow and shine, but it is really inappropriate to glorify people who have serious criminal records and that athletes who should really be role models for children in the stands or next to the television get involved in "it".
After all, the investigation is not over and maybe one day we will find out what was the motive for his murder: the clash between the clans, his wrong behavior towards someone, the way to take over the tribune and what goes with that "job". And until that happens or until one of the long-term participants and witnesses in the criminalization of the stand and sports in Serbia decides to speak, this story will be quickly forgotten and replaced by some new "scandal". There will be fewer and fewer "civilians" on the stand, and there will be more and more shooting on the street, because no one stands in the way of the "rulers of the street".
Minister Stefanović said nicely that Serbia is at war. Just like that.
