Few believe new religious leader can stop a damaging power struggle within the Muslim community.

By Tamara Causidis in Skopje (Balkan Insight, 22 Sept 06)

Long standing tensions over the leadership of Macedonia’s large Muslim community appeared to end on September 20 after Sulejman Rexhepi was elected as the new Reis ul-Ulema or clerical leader.

The election comes on the back of months of intense infighting between Muslim factions, which flared up after the last religious leader resigned and was temporarily replaced.

Local observers and insiders say the internal strife comes down to a struggle between old power groups motivated by political and economic interests.

But many doubt the election of the new head will stop the ugly clashes that have rocked the country’s second largest religious community.

For months, the uproar has made news headlines as rival groups jostled for the position of Reis ul-Ulema.

Ominously, on the night before Rexhepi’s election, unknown assailants fired shots at the building where the vote was to take place.

Rexhepi later blamed criminal groups for the shooting.

“They need to throw away their Kalashnikovs and stop using force,” Rexhepi said, adding that all such incidents in the run up to the election stemmed from disrespect for the rule of law.

Insiders say discord in the Islamic Religious Community, IVZ, comes from the collision between various politically-backed clans, whose battles have dimmed the chance of reform and prevented younger, more educated members from assuming leadership positions.

They say the clashes have little to do with genuine religious differences, and speak more of a quest for money, privilege and political influence.

The IVZ represents a range of ethnic groups in Macedonia, including Albanians, Turks, Bosniaks, Roma and ethnic Macedonians. The largest single group is the Albanians, who make up 25 per cent of the country’s two-million citizens.

The IVZ has access to considerable wealth. Besides the regular income it gets from believers, it stands to gain a large property portfolio if and when the state returns land nationalised after the Second World War.

“We are talking about assets and land worth hundreds of millions of euros that should be given back to the IVZ,” said Osman Memeti, the IVZ’s education officer.

Even without this denationalised property, the IVZ receives a significant income from believers’ taxes, donations, and pilgrimages, and from renting out facilities.

Behuxhudin Shehapi, chair of the non-governmental organisation, El Hilal and director of the National Bureau for Protection of Cultural Monuments, says several factions within the community’s management have stirred up the recent conflicts.

“This is a fight for the leading position, which ensures privileges and access to IVZ’s funds,” he said.

Osman Memeti agreed, warning that the clashes were taking a severe toll. “In the battle for leadership, the faith is being neglected in the interest of certain groups,” he said.

The new Reis was elected after a turbulent 15 months in which the post was filled in an interim basis by Bahri Aliu, who himself took over after demands for the replacement of the mufti of Skopje, Zenun Berisha, led to a serious dispute.

Owing to the city’s large Muslim congregations and significant property, Skopje’s mufti has huge power inside the IVZ and is influential in electing the community head.

“Different groups were attempting to impose their own man as mufti of Skopje, knowing he would then play an important role in electing the Reis,” Memeti said. “That is crystal clear if you have in mind that the Skopje mufti is the greatest of them all.”

The crisis appeared resolved for a brief moment when Berisha was removed. The head of the IVZ, Arif Emini, also handed in his resignation and Bahri Aliu was appointed temporarily, pending an election for the post.

But the ructions did not die down entirely. In what was seen as an attempt to pressure the outcome, just before the new Reis was to be voted in, unknown people stormed the premises of the mufti of Tetovo, a town in western Macedonia, forcing employees to leave and blocking the entrance to the building.

Tetovo’s mufti, Ali Fekri Esati, told Balkan Insight he was mystified. “We reported the case to the police but we did not know the identity of the attackers,” he said.

Local media claimed that the incident was the work of a group who blamed the Tetovo mufti for opposing prompt elections for a new leader.

“The election of the head [of the IVZ] is the least of our problems,” Esati had said. Two days after the attack, however, the mufti agreed that the election of the Reis should be held as soon as possible.

Experts say the heads of the IVZ’s competing clans took power back when Macedonia was part of the former Yugoslavia, whose communist authorities made a point of keeping power from younger, more educated Muslims.

Osman Memeti said these old religious officials remained in place, operating “as if they were still in the time of the former Yugoslavia”.

“The IVZ has no computer or internet. For these old officials… functions and privileges, not Islam, are important,” he said.

Ramadan Ramadani, the cleric or “hoxha” of the Isa Beg mosque in Skopje, agreed, saying the old guard wanted to prevent the younger generation taking over in order to keep control.

Some also suspect that the battles surrounding the election of a community leader reflect power struggles within the Albanian political community.

There is bitter rivalry in the Albanian political camp between the Democratic Union for Integration, DUI, and the Democratic Party of Albanians, DPA.

Some believe the IVZ has become a battlefield for the parties, with each hoping to take control of the religious establishment.

Xhevad Hot of the Hatunxhuk mosque in Skopje said the IVZ election was timed to take place after Macedonia’s general election on July 5, so that relations between the IVZ and the victorious party or parties could be coordinated.

“They waited to see who would win the parliamentary elections so that they could install am IVZ leader who could rely on the support of the [Albanian] ruling party,” said Hot.

The local media in Tetovo also interpreted the shooting there as political pressure from the DPA, which became part of the government coalition after the July poll, and which they said wanted to install its own man as head of the IVZ.

The DPA denied these accusations. “The Islamic Religious Community has its own bodies and should resolve its misunderstandings on its own. We believe there is no room for politics in this institution,” Xhelal Bayrami, the DPA spokesman, said. The DUI also called for politics to be left outside the IVZ.

The new Reis has told the media, “I want to restore trust in the institutions of the IVZ”.

But many fear the circumstances of Rexhepi’s election will only weaken the confidence of believers in an institution that should be the mainstay of their religious life.

Muhamed Zekiri, an analyst, says the hurried election of Rexhepi and the way the other candidates were eliminated means the election may not end the strife.

Zekiri said that in previous posts he held during the Nineties, Rexhepi was not known as a peacemaker, and had always created an atmosphere of conflict between various interest groups. “There will not be any change for the better,” he predicted.

Memeti was more optimistic, saying Rexhepi could make a fresh start “if he manages to unite the conflicting factions and push for reform”. But he, too, warned that some of the same old factions “may again stir up problems, and it won’t be peaceful”.

Tamara Causidis is BIRN Macedonia editor. Balkan Insight is BIRN`s online publication.

Balkan Insight is a publication of the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network.
Source: Balkan Investigative Reporting Network