Mandić congratulates July 13th: Special tribute to Jakov Kusovac, Major of the Army of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia

The President of the Parliament of Montenegro, Andrija Mandić, today sent an official congratulatory message to all fellow citizens on the occasion of July 13 - the Day of Statehood and National Uprising, the Parliament of Montenegro announced today.

We are reprinting his congratulatory message in its entirety:

"Dear fellow citizens, I would like to extend my most sincere and heartfelt congratulations to all of you on July 13, the day when the statehood of the Principality of Montenegro was internationally recognized in 1878 and the day when, in 1941, our ancestors raised a nationwide uprising for liberation from fascist occupation. The uprising was raised together by those for whom, until then, in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, it was inconceivable that they could sit at the same table. This is our great achievement and this is the full meaning of anti-fascism in Montenegro, because our grandparents were not predominantly motivated to rise by reading Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, but by reading and vows of Petar II Petrović Njegoš and Saint Peter of Cetinje.

Today I would like to pay special tribute to one of the key leaders of the insurgents – Jakov Kusovac, a major in the army of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, who commanded the best organized detachment in the battle of Košćele, on the road from Rijeka Crnojevića to Cetinje, where the insurgents won their greatest victory. This hero of the uprising was simply erased and removed from all these great events by the totalitarian communist regime and false, helpful historians through the ubiquitous revision of history at that time.

And therefore, dear fellow citizens, guided by the idea of ​​national unity, one of the symbols of which is July 13, 1941, I would like to say – Anti-fascism always and everywhere, totalitarianism never again. It is up to us today to preserve peace, harmony, democracy and national unity.

It is up to us to turn to a better future. Montenegro is free today. The time of autocracy is over. There are no more infallible leaders and the building of a personality cult of any individual. We will become the first member of the European Union, we are learning democracy and we are all working on ourselves to be better. Let us adopt all those values ​​that were defined long ago by the community of developed European nations and we will not make mistakes. Let us move forward and not return to the past. Let us condemn and leave totalitarian ideologies in the past. They must not lead new young generations. Let historians deal with those detours that we have been on for a long time.

Let us dedicate ourselves to the goal of making Montenegro a country of free, happy and wealthy people, just as, I deeply believe, our ancestors wanted, who took up arms on July 13, 1941, to drive the occupier from our country.

May God bless Montenegro!

"Happy July 13th," Mandić said.