Yugoslav elite feel workers' wrath

Genex tower is a symbol of Milosevic-era state-run business

In this story: Managers despised by workers Employees forced employers to resign Four cars RELATED STORIES, SITES

By Steve Nettleton, CNN.com correspondent

BELGRADE, Yugoslavia -- A second uprising is sweeping through Serbia in the wake of the massive street protests that forced Slobodan Milosevic to accept defeat in last month's Yugoslav presidential election.

Bankers, trade consultants, teachers, factory workers and miners are mobilising to purge their companies’ directors, many of whom were appointed to their posts by the Milosevic government.

Within days of the inauguration of Vojislav Kostunica as president, workers were storming into managers’ offices, demanding their resignations.

VIDEO CNN's Patricia Kelly reports on an 'emotional' welcome of Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica to the European Union summit Play video (QuickTime or Windows Media)     AUDIO Kostunica: Milosevic has no political future 349kb / 32 seconds WAV sound     MESSAGE BOARD Peace in the Balkans

Some went peacefully. When Radoman Bozovic, chairman of Yugoslavia’s largest state-run import-export company Genex, arrived at his office last week, hundreds of employees were waiting in the lobby. Overwhelmed by jeers and complaints hurled at him by the mob, Bozovic surrendered and resigned on the spot.

“Genex used to be a name in the world. It was a legend,” said Slavica Simonovic, a manager of the company’s luxury car rental business. “Mr. Bozovic decided to destroy Genex. He wanted to erase the company.”

For his part, Bozovic says he never wanted to break apart the company. He says he did all he could do to keep Genex afloat during hard times.

In the 1980s, Genex was a corporate empire, with an annual $6 billion in sales from its dealings in hotels, travel, electronics, aviation and pharmaceuticals, as well as other businesses.

In 1989, Milosevic fired Genex’s popular director, Milorad Savicevic, and placed political allies in top company posts. These new managers were despised by workers, who viewed them as government cronies who lived off the wealth of the company.

“They lived like Rockefellers, with gorgeous cars and Tahitian resort homes,” said Simonovic. “The rest of us: we lived in small apartments, eating in the kitchen.”

International sanctions against Yugoslavia began to take a heavy toll on Genex in the mid to late 1990s. Bozovic, a former Serbian prime minister and speaker of federal parliament who was appointed by Milosevic in March 1999, began selling key company assets and ordered hundreds of lay-offs.

More than 300 fired employees, including Simonovic, refused to accept Bozovic’s severance package. Though they were assigned to “forced leave” and earned a mere 15 German marks a month, they preferred to stick with the company and fight for change.

When Milosevic conceded an end to 13 years in power earlier this month, Simonovic knew that change had come.

“We are ten years behind the rest of Europe and the world now,” she said. “But at least now we have hope things will improve.”

Savicevic has returned to lead his former company through a period of transition, but he says he won’t stay on the job for long. He says he wants new management to come from within, not from political appointments.

While Genex saw its leadership change rather peacefully, the departures of other companies’ directors were not so quiet.

In the southern Serbian city of Nis, employees stormed the state-run textile company, ordering the dismissal of top management.

At the large trading firm, Progres, employees forced most managers to resign

Striking workers at the Kolubara mine outside of Belgrade ordered the Serbian electric power company to fire its senior executives.

At the powerful trading firm Progres, which is owned by Serbian Prime Minister Mirko Marjanovic, nearly the entire management team resigned after demands by employees.

Marjanovic, however, has refused to leave, pledging to retake control of the Serbian police and put an end to what he called ‘illegal’ purges of company management.

There are no signs so far he is succeeding in reasserting authority over security forces.

“You can’t talk about ‘legal’ when for the last 10 years, you’ve been doing illegal things,” said Progres consultant Konstantin Kostic, who accuses Marjanovic of benefiting financially and politically from shady deals with Milosevic.

Kostic has worked for Progres for 22 years. He says he once lived quite comfortably, travelling around the world on company business and earning a good income. The era of Milosevic brought a change for the worse.

“In 1991, I had four cars in front of my house. Now I have one car that is 12 years old,” he said. “My mother has to send me new shoes from Greece.”

Kostic says if Marjanovic does not leave voluntarily, workers may resort to using force.

“If the only way to let someone know he’s not wanted is to beat him, then that’s what we’ll do. But it won’t be our fault,” he said.

“We have to start work from scratch. No more of the state giving people jobs. Now we have to work… I don’t need Milosevic to make an income. I can do it myself if they’ll let me.”

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U.S. lifts oil, travel sanctions against Yugoslavia
October 12, 2000

Federal Republic of Yugoslavia

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