The Janus-like European face of the DPS

Three decades of DPS rule can be read as a unique anatomy of social collapse from books: Moliere's facade democracy Tartuffe (or the Imposter), Gogol's bureaucratic farce Dead souls and the world of Dostoevsky from Evil spirits - with an abundance of dark shadows, private interests, corruption and the destruction of the very foundations of society.

The agreement between DPS and United Russia is therefore not just an episode from the party's history. It is a deeply compromising document, politically and in terms of security, in direct conflict with Montenegro's then publicly proclaimed strategic goal: full membership in the European Union and NATO.

In 2011, Montenegro already had the status of an EU candidate and formally pursued a policy of harmonization with the Union's common foreign and security policy. At the same time, after the Bucharest summit in 2008, it was de facto in the NATO waiting room. The entire public rhetoric of the DPS was based on the Euro-Atlantic course and partnership with the EU and the USA.

In such a context, signing a formal party arrangement with the ruling party of a country that was already openly confronting the West could not have been political naivety or a protocol error. It was a conscious entry into the Russian sphere of political influence, contrary to the course that the same government publicly presented as the state interest.

The text of the agreement provides for regular consultations on “current issues of the situation in the Russian Federation and Montenegro, bilateral and international relations”, exchange of delegations, coordination in legislative bodies, joint seminars and “broad public information” on the positions of the two parties. Translated into the language of politics: an institutionalized channel has been established through which the ruling party of Russia, an extended arm of the Kremlin, is given the opportunity to influence the positions and actions of the ruling party in Montenegro.

The problem is not just political “friendship”. The problem is in the formalization of the mechanism through which Russian interpretations of international issues can be introduced into the Montenegrin political system. The part that talks about coordination and exchange of experiences along the line of representatives in the legislative bodies is particularly problematic. This is no longer ordinary inter-party cooperation.

This is opening up space for harmonizing political positions and parliamentary behavior with the interests of a foreign power, beyond serious democratic and institutional control.

In a system in which the DPS was the dominant government, any serious action against the party also meant action against the state. That is why this agreement also has a clear security dimension. Through it, Moscow obtained what it had been seeking for years throughout the post-Soviet and Balkan space: an informal, non-transparent channel of influence through the ruling party, politically powerful enough to produce state consequences, and informal enough to escape serious oversight.

Additional suspicion is raised by claims that the true version of the agreement is not available to the public, as well as assessments that a different, watered-down version was presented to Western partners. Even if such claims are taken with a grain of salt, the very fact that there is room for them speaks volumes about the nature of the arrangement: it is non-transparent, politically dangerous, and deeply compromising.

At the same time, declaratively being loyal to the EU and NATO, and building formal channels of coordination with the ruling party of an authoritarian state in Moscow, is not diplomacy. It is a double game. It is a deception towards Western partners, but above all towards the citizens of Montenegro. In doing so, the DPS sent a message that European integration is acceptable to it as long as it serves as a rhetorical cover, but not when it means a real break with old patterns of power and old foreign policy reflexes.

Such an agreement compromised not only the DPS, but also the reputation of the state itself. Montenegro, which became a member of NATO in 2017, is retroactively seen as a space through which Russian influence could seek its channels and supports. This further explains the later strong reactions to Russian activities, to the attempted coup in 2016, and to the persistently high level of distrust towards certain segments of the Montenegrin political system.

Politically, this is a stark example of the DPS's servile and clientelistic policy towards the Kremlin, incompatible with the values ​​that the party has formally invoked for years: democracy, human rights and the rule of law. From a security perspective, this is an arrangement that opened the door to systemic Russian influence in the party, parliamentary and media structures of Montenegro. Normatively, this is an agreement that the ruling party of a country that is a candidate for the EU and a future member of NATO should never have signed.

That is why today, alongside the exposure of DPS, another question arises: are PES, Mandić, the Democrats and their partners in the government truly pro-European forces or just a new face of the old political fraud? Is there a real European decision behind the European rhetoric, or just new Janus-like faces of Montenegrin politics?

The answer is not in statements, but in results. Not in phrases, but in alliances. Not in declarations, but in the willingness to break with the practices that have kept Montenegro trapped for years between corruption, clientelism and political hypocrisy.

On one side are the citizens, more than 80 percent of whom support Montenegro's European path. On the other are parts of the political class, media networks and corrupt-criminal structures for whom a European Montenegro is not a goal, but a threat. Because Europe, when taken seriously, does not only mean slogans, funds and photo shoots. It means the end of the privatized state, the end of political protection and the end of a system in which party loyalty is more important than the law.

That is why every exposure is healing, including the exposure of DPS. Every pro-European effort that brings air into the suffocating atmosphere of double games, farce and provincial cynicism is healing. Aligning with Brussels is also healing - without calculations, without backup combinations and without flirting with the autocratic reflexes that have dragged Montenegro back for too long. Because Montenegro no longer has time for political Tartuffes (or impostors). Neither old nor new.

Only a combination of external support and pressure and internal determination can break the thirty-year octopus of anti-European interests and influences. That is why everyone is on the test: the government, the opposition, the DPS, their satellites, and their media and business patrons. A European society is not created by changing slogans. It is created only when old protections fall, when old agreements are broken and when institutions cease to be backdrops for other people's interests.

History will not remember the number of closed chapters. It will remember: whether Montenegro finally broke with the double game, hidden alliances and policies that hold citizens hostage to the past, corruption and anti-European centers of power, whether it truly became a member of the European Union.

This breakup is not a gesture. It is not a declaration. It is a long and daily political showdown with the old order. Building a different system in which institutions outlive leaders is not a matter of choice, but of the bare political survival of the state.

All actors on the Montenegrin scene must go through this path, including DPS. Until that happens, their politics will remain trapped in the past. And Montenegro no longer has the time or reason to wait for them. Until then - travel, abbot.