Dragoljub Micunovic, one of the founders of the first Yugoslav opposition party, the Democratic Party, in the era of the autocratic leader Slobodan Milosevic, has died aged 95. He was one of the main actors during the democratic changes in the former Yugoslavia in 2000.
Micunovic was born in 1930 in the Serbian southern region of Toplica.
During the conflict between Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union in 1948, he was among the members of the Yugoslav Communist Party who were suspected of being “pro-Stalinist”, and spent 20 months on Goli Otok, an infamous prison camp for political detainees.
In 1960, he became an Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade. He was among the organisers of the anti-government protests of June 1968. Although the protests lasted only seven days in Belgrade, they were important as the first popular revolt in the country since it became communist after World War II. The protesters criticised rising social inequality, bureaucratization, unemployment and demanded free speech and the abolition of privileges, as the academic work of Aleksandar Pavlovic and Mark Losoncz explains.
Due to his opposition activity, he was removed from the Faculty of Philosophy together with seven colleagues by a special law passed in 1975, the Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory wrote in Micunovic’s biography. He was a guest lecturer at universities in the US and Germany. In 1990, he returned to teaching at the Faculty of Philosophy.
Micunovic was one of the founders of the Democratic Party, the first opposition party in Yugoslavia, in 1989, and was elected its first president. Ten years later, he was one of those who called on all opposition parties in Serbia to unite, which resulted in the formation of the Democratic Opposition of Serbia coalition. This coalition was crucial for the democratic changes and final overthrow of Milosevic’s regime on October 5, 2000.
Following the election victory of the Democratic Opposition of Serbia, Micunovic was elected President of the Chamber of Citizens of the federal parliament in October 2000. After the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro was established in March 2003, he was elected President of the Assembly of Serbia and Montenegro.
The Democratic Party said on Tuesday that it was saying farewell to “a man whose life was marked by the struggle for freedom, democracy, and the dignity of politics in Serbia.
“Dragoljub Micunovic belonged to a generation of people who understood the price of freedom because they paid for it personally, yet never gave up the fight for a democratic Serbia. As a philosopher, professor, political prisoner, parliamentarian, and democrat, he left a legacy that transcends a single party and belongs to Serbia’s political history,” the party said.
In 2014, he was elected to the National Assembly of Serbia and was subsequently re-elected in 2016. He served as a member of parliament until the next elections, in June 2020.
He was a recipient of numerous awards for promoting democracy and tolerance, including the French Legion of Honour medal.