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Kilibard

Novak was all about contrasts, often spectacular

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Novak Kilibarda, 2009, Photo: Boris Pejović
Novak Kilibarda, 2009, Photo: Boris Pejović
Disclaimer: The translations are mostly done through AI translator and might not be 100% accurate.

Novak Kilibarda is one of the prominent figures of recent Montenegrin history, whether one likes it or not.

He is also among those personalities whose reach and influence are not easy to "measure". Those things in which he was the best, I mean his work as a professor and his work in folk literature, did not bring him the "fame" that his work in politics did. Although this "glory" in Montenegro is "too cheap, nowhere else".

Novak was all about contrasts, often spectacular.

He had a keen sense of language, and was a superb linguist. His prose primarily takes place in language and is a monument to the Montenegrin language. In his Montenegrin Chronicle there are many interesting pages, but it is hard to escape the impression that the professor ate the writer.

Spectacular was his overshoot with Metropolitan Amfilochius - both aspired to leadership over the Montenegrin Serbs. In an article about Metropolitan Novak, he recalls their visit to Golija. The host brought out a sumptuous meal, welcomed famous guests, half the village redeemed itself. But as the weather suddenly frowned, as he knows on the mountain, the host suggested that the guests enter the house. Novak says that he then noticed the expression of relief on Amfilochius' face, obviously he was not comfortable with the Goliath thunder. Of course, that was enough for Novak to insist that they stay outside, with the explanation - Come on, please, God won't send thunderbolts on the Montenegrin bishop...

The Metropolitan of the Serbian Orthodox Church did not owe him - his wording is famous, that even though he never believed that man came from monkeys, Novak Kilibarda could be proof that he came from - foxes.

Novak was the undisputed leader of Serbia in Montenegro in the early nineties (Soon Kilibarda will rule Montenegro, the fighters for Greater Serbia sang at the time), but also one of the few who evolved, which earned him fierce hatred among some of the more "traditional" Serbs, who are not inclined to any evolutions.

Nevertheless, when his evolution, after an ethical and cultural breakthrough (the capitally important Narodna Sloga), acquired its own political dimension - that is, when he completely moved to the side of the then Đukanović authorities, sometimes he showed an excess of enthusiasm. Admittedly, that was the mode of DPS action towards intellectuals - those who "let themselves" be made rags out of them, and those who resist, immediately become enemies. The trouble is that when you make a "rag" out of an intellectual, his word can have no weight, and the government can't benefit from them either. That's why it's such a den.

I remember Kilibarda from the time when he liked to visit the newsroom of Vijesti. From the front door to the editor-in-chief's office, it was always a kind of theater, but not without its charm. He liked the people from Vijesti to complain about politicians, to marvel at their lack of education and corruption. Which did not bother him that, when Vijesti was declared the main enemy, such visits suddenly became rarer.

There is no better (and truer) portrait of NK than the one in the book Slavoljub Šćekić - "Novak Kilibarda: Confession about the decade that changed the face of Montenegro". His honest confession about the "founding" of the party is a unique confirmation of the way the secret police worked at that time.

But there is one detail that "saves" Novak Kilibarda from others and from himself.

These days marked one of the most shameful Montenegrin anniversaries - the inhumane deportation of Bosnian refugees who were delivered under the knife. Karadžić's villains. The DPS public does not like to be reminded of that event - because it does not fit into their mantra of a multicultural government that saved Montenegro from evil.

What should not be forgotten about Novak Kilibarda is that he did not, like Đukanović, choose denial and falsification. He went to Srebrenica and paid homage to the victims of the monstrous genocide.

That cathartic step is a more significant political act than all the mischief, complications or ego poses that most remember him for.

Bonus video:

(Opinions and views published in the "Columns" section are not necessarily the views of the "Vijesti" editorial office.)