Actress: Serbian Government Gaslighting the People

Bojana Novakovic (BETAPHOTO/MILOS MISKOV/DS)

Actress Bojana Novakovic, the coordinator of the "Mars sa Drine" (Get off the Drina) campaign, said on Nov. 25 that the people of Serbia are "literally faced with a government that wants to sell off [its] people and [the country's] natural resources."

In an interview for the Novi Magazin weekly, Novakovic said that the Serbian government is acting "unbelievably" and resorting to tactics for which the Serbian language does not have an adequate term. "But in English, they call it 'gaslighting'," she says, explaining that the term refers to situations where "the perpetrator of abuse creates the impression that the victim is crazy -- that the victim is the actual cause of the problem." 

"This is what our government is doing to the people, all while collecting our tax money, arresting dissidents and legalizing [the] colonization [of Serbian land]," says Novakovic, who put her successful career as an actress in New York and Melbourne on hold to return home and defend Serbia from an environmental catastrophe in the making. In collaboration with over 20 environmental groups and NGOs, Novakovic organized a nation-wide campaign titled "Mars sa Drine" opposing the opening of a jadarite mine in the Jadar river basin. The title of the campaign is a play or words referencing the river Drina, which is in danger of severe pollution should mining start near its tributary the Jadar.

Asked whether the Serbian diaspora is aware of the problems Serbia's population is dealing with, Novakovic responded that Serbian expats are very interested in everything transpiring in their homeland and that they know the people of Serbia are breathing air full of toxic particles and surviving off meager salaries and pensions.

"The citizens of Serbia are [now] fighting to preserve what little freedom and democracy they have left. The people of Serbia are fighting against the media, which are not free, and against a corrupt government. The government now wants to change the law on the expropriation of land to legalize the colonization of Serbia. They are putting the country itself up for sale on every level. We are literally faced with a government that wants to sell off our people and our natural resources," Novakovic concluded.