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In George Orwell’s 1984, there’s a memorable exchange between Winston Smith and his interrogator, O’Brien. It goes like this:

Winston: “Does Big Brother exist?”
O’Brien: “Of course he exists. The Party exists. Big Brother is the embodiment of the Party.”
Winston: “Does he exist in the same way as I exist?”
O’Brien: “You do not exist.”

Yesterday, in a nationwide referendum, Slovenians voted that roughly 20,000 of its residents do not exist. These people, known as izbrisani (”the erased”) were residents of Slovenia (generally Croatians, Bosnians and Serbs) who failed to apply for Slovenian citizenship after independence and were promptly removed from the national registry. With their removal from the registry they lost their pensions, health benefits, and in some cases, employment.

Many of them were longtime residents who either had no idea that they had to apply for citizenship or who simply put their faith in their old Yugoslav passports. In retrospect, deciding in favor of Yugoslavia was a mistake, but keep in mind that even the United States initially refused to acknowledge Slovenia’s independence. But while the U.S. has been forgiven, the “erased” continue to linger in legal limbo.

Until last year, that is, when the constitutional court (Slovenia’s highest court) ruled that the rights of the “erased” should be restored. What should have been the end of the story turned out to be the beginning. Some analysts estimate that compensating the “erased” could run up to €2.5 billion. For a small country like Slovenia, that’s almost 7% of GDP.

Naturally, the idea (hyped by the conservative parties) that foreign residents will be richly rewarded for not declaring their loyalty to Slovenia early on, has enraged a significant segment of the population. In the referendum yesterday, over 94% voted against the law to restore rights to the izbrisani.

However, it’s unclear what effect (if any) the referendum will have, since the court has already ruled that the erased should have their rights returned — and they remain the highest legal authority.

See also: Slovenians Vote on the Erased by the Associated Press

Posted on Monday, April 5, 2004 to Slovenia ¦ Comments (4)