Not a Fairy Tale But… Reckon with Us; Fifth Chapter, First Part

23 Jun Not a Fairy Tale But… Reckon with Us; Fifth Chapter, First Part

First part of the June Monthly Chapter
Written by Dragan Markovina
Voiceover by Marija Drndić

Telling the story of Heni Erceg – of her steadfast resistance to evil, her genuine commitment to the idea of independent journalism, human equality, and her struggle against opportunism – is no easy task. Her story is simultaneously as sorrowful and painful as it is sublime. Although we all in this region shared the fate of Yugoslavia’s collapse, the ensuing war and its consequences, and the wholesale disintegration of social norms – accompanied by mass violence against minorities and those who refused to opportunistically defect to the winning side, only to be branded “commies” and “Yugoslavs” – anyone who did not live in Split during that era, or even today, can hardly grasp the extent of the violence and harassment to which people like Heni were exposed.

And yet, none of it had to be that way. On the contrary, Heni Erceg possessed all the prerequisites for a comfortable career at Croatian Radio-Television, adorned with social accolades, had she only accepted the stance of the opportunistic majority and aligned herself with the necessity of regime propaganda. Had she only agreed to stand by in silence as her Serbian colleagues were shown the door to dismissal.

Although I was already aware of many of these facts, when we sat down this May in front of the iconic Hotel Park at Bačvice in Split to record a conversation for this occasion, discussing everything that shaped her and the events that decisively influenced her life and career path—and even though I understand all too well what it means to be exposed to the threats and hatred of the Split streets – I still left that conversation with a certain sadness. This time, I was finally conscious of Heni Erceg’s solitary position and the public’s inability to comprehend her perspective. Truth be told, had it not been for the mutual recognition and love between her and Viktor Ivančić, it is difficult to imagine she would have successfully weathered it all.

Then again, once one becomes acquainted with her background and personality, it becomes clear that it could not have been any other way. It is true—and we opened this topic at the end of our conversation – that in different circumstances, in healthier times, her career would have taken a different turn. Heni began as a philosophy professor in a Split high school, and later, after completing her Master’s thesis on the writer Antun Šoljan, she aspired to work in academia. However, following her initial foray into journalism in the early 1980s, it was clear she would never leave it. No matter how hard they tried to drive her out.

Heni Erceg was, above all, a child of pre-war communists – the offspring of a love between a revolutionary from Komiža and a teacher from Korčula. Their bond, forged in the necessity of flight from occupied Komiža, continued through marriage on the offshore island of Svetac, a subsequent path through the Partisan resistance, and the refugee camps of El Shatt. After finally settling in Split and narrowly escaping arrest and deportation to the Goli Otok gulag, her father’s journey culminated in a quiet life on the fringes of the communist movement. Their cinematic life story was chronicled by the iconic Split professor and writer from Komiža, Joško Božanić; yet, her father never truly recovered from the “comradely betrayal” that made his post-war visits to his birthplace exceptionally rare. Instead, he chose to build a holiday house on Šolta – a strange, solitary island which, alongside Brač, sits closest to Split. Her father’s retirement days, especially those following the collapse of Yugoslavia, served as the inspiration for Viktor Ivančić’s character of the “Grandfather from Šolta” in the Notebooks of Robi K.

In essence, her father was a prominent figure of the pre-war communist movement in Komiža and one of the organizers of the Partisan resistance. However, because he refused a directive to blow up the “Neptun” sardine factory—first, because it was feeding the town at the time, and second, because he was aware that the ensuing retaliation would destroy the local movement – he fell out of favor with the Party, only to be later arrested by the Italian occupiers. Nevertheless, this same man refused to move to America from El Shatt, despite his wife’s wishes, and was later saved from Goli Otok by the intervention of Pavle Gregorić from a diplomatic post in Rome. He remained faithful to the communist idea, the reformed party in Croatia, and the concept of Yugoslavia until the very end, never failing to emphasize this even in a completely transformed political and social context. Why do I write all this, and why did I open our conversation with this topic? Because the fate of her parents profoundly defined her, despite the fact that she was, and remains, anything but a dogmatic communist like her father. In fact, she joined the Party only at the insistence of Ante Jurjević Baja – the man who held real power in socialist Split until the end – and solely because it was presented to her as a fundamental prerequisite for employment. She left of her own volition shortly thereafter. Yet, it seems as though her father’s constant life on the edge of dissidence, his struggle against injustice and senseless decisions, and his authentic patriotism were the factors that truly shaped her own choices. That is my conclusion, as I did not ask her explicitly. Certainly, lately, Heni has considered writing her father’s biography; while researching, she read available files from the Split archives regarding his interrogations by Party comrades during the dangerous post-war years—years of constant surveillance and mistrust. It is certain that her father’s destiny occupies her thoughts deeply.

Heni became the journalist we know today upon joining the Split bureau of Television Zagreb. It was a time of perhaps the greatest media freedoms, when one regime had sufficiently weakened and the next had yet to be established. She confirmed this during our talk, citing her own example: she published an article in Nedjeljna Dalmacija about the futility of Partisan anniversaries on the Riva and the speeches of Jure Bilić. It passed without actual consequences, though it triggered a grueling debate about her case within the Party organization of the TV bureau. Several key moments marked her television career. Primarily, there was the fact that, by a twist of fate – specifically as a punishment—she was assigned to report from the so-called “Knin Krajina.” There, she witnessed firsthand the gradual creation of a nationalist atmosphere fueled by iconic Serbian writers like Dobrica Ćosić and Matija Bećković arriving from Belgrade, realizing early on where it was all leading. She recognized this even more clearly in the late 1980s in Kosovo, where she reported on several occasions. It was precisely because of her reports from Kosovo that she was first physically assaulted by an inflamed Serbian nationalist near her building. In an indicative sign of the shifting atmosphere in Croatia at the time, the attacker was immediately and severely sentenced by the court.

She was later assaulted a second time, but this time the attack carried a different hallmark: she was set upon by a security guard at the television station. He lunged at her in a rage after she tore a list from the door – a list of names, mostly Serbian colleagues, above which stood a notice that they were forbidden from entering the building. She went straight to the police to report the assault, where, by sheer coincidence, she encountered Ivan Vekić, Tuđman’s then-Minister of the Interior. He dismissed her report and the injury she showed him with a laconic and cynical shrug, calling it merely “one of the processes of state-building.” In the midst of all this, the most brutal phase of the war in Croatia began. She reported from the most sensitive frontlines, from Osijek and Slavonia, where the war was escalating. From there, she was practically evacuated in an emergency intervention by the then-editor-in-chief of HRT, Miroslav Lilić, because the “master of Slavonia,” Branimir Glavaš, was “unsatisfied with her reporting.”