On the eve of another election, in Bosanska Posavina there is talk again about return, renewal and better living conditions. But, while new promises are coming, there are fewer and fewer people in the villages. In Veliki Prnjavor near Doboj, out of the former 154 households, today only 14 houses have been renovated, and only four have been moved into. Their residents are in their eighth and ninth decades of life. What is left of the return and why does Posavina continue to disappear?
Out of 154 households, the remaining four houses
Out of the former 154 households, 14 houses have been renovated in Veliki Prnjavor. Four were renovated by the returnees with their own funds.
“Constantly, how many of us live here, that’s four houses. I’m the youngest. All of them are approximately 80 years old or older,” says Slavko Gavran, president of the Veliki Prnjavor local community near Doboj.
The initial momentum of the return subsided due to numerous obstacles, the slowness of reconstruction of residential buildings and infrastructure, devastation of property and illegal cutting of forests.
“You can see for yourself what it’s like here. There is nothing – no roads, no schools, no shops,” emphasizes Ilija Bratanić, a temporary resident of Veliki Prnjavor.
Returnees without trust in promises
Another election is welcomed by the few returnees without great expectations. They say they no longer trust politicians.
“It is important to promise them, and after that they forget everything. They find us when they need us. When we need them, they are not there,” says Grgo Bratanić, a returnee to Veliki Prnjavor.
Elections come and go, just like the promises that accompany them. There are no young people, and there are fewer and fewer older people. Before the elections, two or three shovel trucks appear in order to fill up the country road through which the occasional hunter or, somewhat more often, a forest thief passes.
Will it be better in Posavina?
Will it be better, we ask the returnees.
“If society changes for the better, then it will be better,” said Anđa Bratanić, a returnee to Veliki Prnjavor.
Ivica Krnjić, a returnee to Bukovac near Doboj, thinks similarly, who hopes for changes, but does not expect much.
“Hope it will get better. But all this is weak, especially here in the RS,” Krnjić said.
Grgo Bratanić believes that political circumstances do not favor the return of Croats to this part of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“It is not in the interest of the RS that the Croats return,” said Bratanić.
Raven: Life goes from promise to promise
Slavko Gavran believes that nothing has fundamentally changed over the years, and warns that residents are slowly disappearing, while political promises are repeated in every election cycle.
“I don’t see that anything will change. I don’t see it, and neither do many others, because every four years from promise to promise. That’s how life passes and that’s how we disappear,” Gavran said.
Since 1992, as a consequence of the political compromise on the division of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the agony of Bosanska Posavina and its inhabitants has been going on. The returnees believe that a change in the destructive attitude of politics towards this area, which was created and maintained by political structures for years, would perhaps bring some better days to this part of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
