Havel greeted with boos in Bratislava (file)
(Archives B2) The Czech and Slovak Republic must commemorate its 73rd anniversary. Everyone is waiting for Vaclav Havel, back from a stay in the United States. A rather impressive police cordon, never seen since the Velvet Revolution in 1989, was deployed on the place of the insurrection.
The Slovak National Movement is determined to impose its separatist will on the "federalists" and the some 5000 activists of the Civic Democratic Union (ODU)* also present. If he only managed to gather a few dozen supporters, against several thousand the previous year, the nationalist party compensates for the lack of votes by their intensity. It is with tenfold rage and hatred that Vaclav Havel and the members of his government are welcomed. Fresh eggs, cries of "Kruj" (fucker), "communist" (!) and other insults rain down.
Only the passage of Dubcek, the former star - Slovak - of the Prague Spring calms things down a bit. But Havel's attempt to obtain two minutes of silence in memory of the founders of the republic ended in failure. On the contrary, cries and insults redouble. The police rushes, under the frightened looks of the officials, extracts from the crowd a passably excited young man and leads him under good escort towards one of his buses. Without extreme violence. But, without doubt, the gesture too much for Vaclav Havel.
Tired, the former defender of human rights decides to leave the place, planting there speeches and supporters red with bitterness, leaving the nationalists surprised by this victory so easy to occupy without a fight, a private platform … of its spectators. For the moment !
(Nicolas Gros-Verheyde, in Bratislava)
Lundi 28 octobre 1991
article published in L'Evènement du Jeudi, October 1991
* new name of the VPN "People against violence", the movement that overthrew the communist regime.