By: Miro Petek
To all who possess a somewhat longer historical memory, Milan Kučan’s statement is well known, that truth is not singular, that everyone has the right to their own truth. Kučan introduced this moral relativism at a time when it was necessary to evaluate our recent history and confront the fact that during and after the Second World War brutal liquidations took place. Kučan, who was and remains a master of subtle manipulation, with his thesis about everyone’s right to their own truth was in fact signalling that the guilt of the perpetrators could not be proven. Indeed, the massacres, their instigators and executioners, remained without judicial epilogue and punishment. At that time, in a longer text, Kučan’s thesis of multiple truths was challenged – and the former party leader duly instructed – by Dr Tine Hribar.
For truth is one.
Slovenia has problems with dwarfish – in every sense of the word – and corrupt politicians. In the triptych of small political apparitions, Kučan and Golob occupy one corner of the dark triangle, while in another sits the President of the Republic, Nataša Pirc Musar. On the Roma issue, at a parliamentary session convened at her initiative, she declared: “Because we messed up together, we are today together responsible for finding solutions.” Just like Kučan, Pirc Musar manipulates when she claims that we all messed up and that we are all guilty for the situation with the Roma. Such collective guilt, of course, leads to the conclusion that in the end no one is guilty. Political responsibility for the situation lies with those in power, the government and all its subsystems, and political responsibility and moral guilt also rest with the President of the Republic. Pirc Musar knew of all the evil and crime, yet from her position did not warn about it, and now she would share this guilt and presidential impotence with us.
Madam President, do not shift your responsibilities onto us, ordinary citizens!
And let us not forget that this kind of distribution of guilt across the entire nation is a perverse act; such accusations have historically proven very dangerous and unacceptable. The Germans as a people were not collectively guilty for the Holocaust and all atrocities after the Second World War. At Nuremberg, individuals were tried. The same applies to the genocide in Srebrenica, close to us, where the Serbian people as a whole were not declared genocidal, but Karadžić, Mladić, Tolimir, Popović, etc. were tried at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague. If Pirc Musar did not spend her time only reading her capital investments and bank account statements, but instead picked up Karl Jaspers or Hannah Arendt, she would not have blundered so badly with her statements.
Guilt is individual, Comrade Nataša Pirc Musar. As President of the Republic and as a moral authority, you must accept political and moral responsibility.
Pirc Musar is a mistake of Slovenian politics. The President is indeed very active in public, but without real substance. The media try to build her strong personal brand, but she lacks charisma and, despite all her worldly prestige, at times appears downright provincial. It is true that the constitution does not grant the president much ruling power, so the focus of her work is on creating the impression of diligence, activity, and efforts to solve the country’s problems. Yet visible results are absent, and with constant appearances and foolish antics on social media (let us recall just one example, when she filmed herself stuffing tripe in the presidential palace), she gives the appearance of activity, relying on the hope that the Slovenian people will not notice the absence of substance and her emptiness. Because she is intellectually very weak, she relies on verbosity; with her presence at all possible village processions across Slovenia, Pirc Musar tries to create the impression that she is one of us. In reality, however, she belongs to the wealthy red capitalist and political bourgeoisie, whose fundamental trait is greed.