The tragedies that shook Tuzla in recent weeks – the case of sexual abuse of minors and the fire in the retirement home in which 13 people lost their lives – opened the question: what kind of society are we if we cannot protect the most vulnerable – children and the elderly?
Video: N1
Although the four-day mourning is over, pain and disbelief are still present in Tuzla.
“You can feel great anxiety around people’s hearts. Citizens are desperate, many families have lost parents, grandparents. Questions are being asked – where will we be one day if we need home care, and can such tragedies be prevented?”, said journalist Maja Nikolić in an interview for N1.
She added that journalists are expecting an announcement from the Prosecutor’s Office of Tuzla Canton today, because, as she says, “there is a big question mark over the heads of the citizens of Tuzla – how could this happen”.
According to her, many experts claim that the tragedy could have been prevented.
“If the fire-fighting installation had worked properly and if the alarms had gone off at the first appearance of smoke, the tragedy would have been much smaller,” said Nikolić.
The injured are still being treated in hospitals.
“One patient is on a ventilator, five are in the Clinic for Pulmonary Diseases, three are in internal medicine and one is in urology. All are stable, except for the patient who is on mechanical ventilation. Somehow, because of this tragedy, everyone still fears that the number of victims could really be much higher,” she said.
“Journalists must not release these stories”
Nikolić emphasizes that now the key role of the media and journalists is to ensure that these two stories do not fall into oblivion.
“We must not allow them to be talked about for two or three days and then disappear. This is the moment when we must be professional and responsible. In the case of the Retirement Home, 13 lives were lost, and in the case of abused girls, the number of victims has already risen to 160. Journalists are obliged to keep their cameras and microphones pointed at the institutions and demand accountability,” he said.
As he points out, the citizens of Tuzla protest every day in front of the Government of TK, demanding resignations and answers.
“It’s up to us to monitor and not allow a cover-up,” adds Nikolić.
“This is not sexual abuse, it is a pedophile crime”
Professor Vedran Zubić does not hide his indignation.
“I am appalled. This is not a case of sexual abuse – it is a pedophile crime. And not just anyone, but those who were supposed to protect children: police officers, inspectors, professors. It is the greatest tragedy that a society can experience,” Zubić said.
He was particularly struck by the fact that a university professor was among those arrested.
“That’s not a professor, that’s moral trash. A man who has children and grandchildren, and commits such evil – he marked them as well. For me, such people deserve the most severe punishments, so that they never see the light of day again,” he said.
Zubić believes that the problem is much wider than a few arrested persons.
“It’s not just six or seven people involved in it. How is it possible that the home didn’t know that? How is it possible for a traffic policeman to let a child driving a luxury car go, because he’s ‘calling someone from above’? Justice and law are not the same thing. Justice is ethical, law is a legal category. I would like to be tried according to justice, not just according to the law,” he said.
“It’s time for responsibility”
Zubić calls for political and moral responsibility.
“In normal countries, the minister resigns when a tragedy occurs. In our country – nothing. When the tragedy is in the canton governed by the SDA, everyone else asks for resignations. When it is in Sarajevo, where ‘theirs’ are, then everything is relativized. Everyone’s resignation immediately!”, he said.
He reminds that in Slovenia the ministers of the interior and justice resigned after the death of the beaten young man, although they were not directly responsible.
“It is political responsibility. In our country, the minister is not to blame even when a home full of pensioners burns down. And we pay them to be responsible for our safety,” he adds.
Speaking about how to talk with students about difficult topics such as sexual violence against children, Zubić says that school must be a place for the truth.
“Children will ask you. You can’t tell them ‘it’s not a topic’. If you inform them and teach them to think, you reduce the risk of them becoming victims. But if society doesn’t punish criminals, how can we teach them empathy?”, he explains.
He adds that young people are brought up in a society that “degrades ethics and rewards crime”.
“Early adolescents don’t have empathy. They don’t have empathy at all. So they can’t express empathy. And then you expect us to raise empathically emotional beings just because we tell them to be emotional, and he opens, I don’t know, any social network and sees unconstitutional activity, a year in prison – buy. A pedophile is that actor, a year in prison – buy. She set up jobs, a year in prison – buy. What’s the message? If someone has 36,500 marks to buy off that year of imprisonment, and then do whatever he wants. Well, that’s the message of the system,” concludes the professor.
“Our pensioners are waiting to die”
Zubić also referred to the tragedy in the Pensioners’ Home.
“In normal countries, when people retire – they start traveling. Here, they wait until they die. It’s as if someone gives them a pension out of mercy, not from what they earned themselves,” he said.
He also reminded that some of the victims were immobile and located on the sixth floor.
“It is a crime. Such people must be on the ground floor. And the explanation that they are ‘closer to the infirmary’ is meaningless. The infirmary can be lowered, the person receiving the infusion does not have to be on the sixth floor,” he says.
After the tragedy, the survivors were placed in empty rooms on the ground floor, which, according to him, shows that they could have been there before.
“Someone signed that that building is safe. That someone must be held accountable,” he says.
“Everything is with us – God’s gift”
The professor criticizes social lethargy.
“In our country, when a tragedy happens, everyone says ‘God’s gift’. That’s the easiest way. When stones fall, a house burns or a child dies – it’s not nature, it’s irresponsibility. And then we’re surprised that everything happens again. We’re not looking for responsibility, but excuses,” Zubić said.
“Patriotism is not cheering, but caring for people”
Speaking about nationalism and incidents in the region, Zubić reminds that Hajduk from Split was once a symbol of anti-fascism, and today we are witnessing attacks on children and athletes.
“Oh, disaster. You know what the football club Hajduk is known for? It didn’t want to play in fascist Italy. It didn’t want to play in fascist Italy. Now you from such an anti-fascist club, where so many Dalmatians died on Sutjeska, where the street in Sarajevo is called Dalmatinska because of the Dalmatian brigade that liberated Sarajevo in 1945, do what you do in Split. Or do what you do in Zagreb. I don’t know how many Serbs there are in Split, I have no idea. Those couple of grandmothers and those children dancing, that’s a problem? So, be a mangup, dear brother, let’s go to the Zvijezda match, so there you go,” said Professor Vedran Zubić.
(TYPE/Source: N1/Photo: Dron.ba)
