Saving Bosnia’s Rivers

Postproduction Script

 

Narration: [00:02  - 19] On an early spring Sunday, volunteers pulled tangles of paper and plastic from a river near Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Near a narrow band of water where trash accumulates, they gathered together to celebrate World Water Day. Sara Tuševljak helped organize the river cleanup.

 

Sara Tuševljak: [00:19  - 32] When I think of my childhood, the most striking memories are those created on the Kasindolska River with my friends. We pretended to be Tarzan. We used to jump to the other side of the river and run into it.

 

Narration: [00:32  - 43] A 24-year-old law student, Tuševljak shares her fondness for the Kasindolska with her friends and family. A few days earlier at a nearby restaurant, they swapped childhood memories of life along the river.

 

Sunčica: [00:43  - 51] Did you say you learned how to swim at the Kasindolska river?

 

Milanko: Not only swim but drown too!

 

Narration: [00:51 - 01:14] But for this community, trash is not the only threat to a river they have cherished since childhood. For years, they have fought against the construction of three small dams along the Kasindolska. In 2016, investors, including a company from Belgium, constructed the first dam. As workers dynamited hills to make way for access roads, the activists say construction ruined previously untouched canyons and forests.

 

Vlado: [01:14 - 01:27] They also cut down a forest and those trees ended up in the river banks. Then they took what can be used and left all the branches and debris.

 

Narration: [01:27 - 01:38] In 2020, when the start of construction on the second dam was announced, they decided to organize. They filed a lawsuit against the investors and then compiled a petition to protest the dam’s construction.

 

Sara Tuševljak: [01:38 - 01:52] We also held a protest here in 2021. We were angry over the inaction of local authorities as well as the failure of City Assembly members to stop the construction of dams along the Kasindolska.

 

Narration: [01:52 - 02:12] It took almost two years, but in late 2021, judges revoked the environmental permits for the three small dams. It was a huge victory for the then-23-year-old law student and her group of friends. When USAID administrator Samantha Power visited Bosnia earlier this year, she stopped to meet the Kasindolska River activists and celebrate their success.

 

[02:12 - 02:24] But the fight isn’t over. The investors have sued Sara Tuševljak for defamation, and last summer, as workers stopped construction on the second dam, she received a threat at her family’s house near the river.

 

Sara Tuševljak: [02:24 - 02:37] I found a nail hammered to the lock of our front door. I was very scared. That fear inspired a rush of negative thoughts. I wondered if I could bring this fight to its end.

 

Narration: [02:37 - 03:07] In Bosnia, investors have built almost 120 small dams and plan to build at least 350 more. They say these dams will benefit the country’s struggling economy and reduce reliance on fossil fuels. But activists counter that these small dams are not green energy: that they will destroy aquatic ecosystems, ruin surrounding forests, and dry out riverbeds. Fights against small dams in Bosnia have become so frequent that activists, including Sara Tuševljak, have formed a national network, the Coalition for the Protection of Rivers.

 

[03:08 - 03:24] In the early spring, she joined coalition members from 30 community groups from across the country at the Buna Channel, a narrow waterway in southern Bosnia that is millions of years old. After two years of separation because of the pandemic, she gathered with fellow activists in person for a strategy and public relations event.

 

Sara Tuševljak: [03:25 - 03:33] First we had a meeting with the Coalition for the Protection of Rivers, then we gave statements to the media, and then we cleaned the Buna Channel.

 

Narration: [03:34 - 03:58] The coalition’s unity, which spans geography and ethnicity, is remarkable in a nation that has remained deeply divided since the end of a war and genocide. In 1992, Bosnia declared independence from Yugoslavia, but its Serb community refused to join the new, multi-ethnic country. Conflict soon erupted between Bosnia’s three main ethnic groups—Muslim Bosniaks, Catholic Croats, and Orthodox Serbs—culminating in a genocide.

 

[03:59 - 04:20] 100,000 people died, of which 80% were Muslim Bosniaks. After it took years for NATO to intervene, politicians negotiated a fragile peace agreement known as the Dayton Accords, which divided the country into two: the Serb-majority Republika Srpska and the Bosniak-Croat majority Federation. Thirty years later, memories of war remain, and hopes for integration are unfulfilled.

 

Lejla Kusturica: [04:20 - 04:30] Ever since the end of the war people are very much divided and also very tired, so it's not often that they come together to fight for something that belongs to them.

 

Narration: [04:30 - 04:35] Lejla Kusturica is a key organizer in the Coalition for the Protection of Rivers.

 

Lejla Kusturica: [04:35 - 04:46] Our politicians are constantly fueling a nationalism among people. I like to stress now that ordinary people in Boston and Herzegovina are perfectly capable of living together.

 

Narration: [04:46 - 05:00] Sara Tuševljak’s community outside Sarajevo is virtually entirely Serb. Here, near the Buna Channel, Bosniaks and Croats are the majority. However, all three ethnicities have banded together for what they call a fight for the life or death of their precious rivers.

 

Lejla Kusturica: [05:00 - 05:26] These are the last free-flowing, wild, drinkable rivers in the Europe and that they need to be preserved precisely because of that. 

Bosnia has over 240 rivers. Our villages were built around rivers. People really depend on the water for livestock: for production of vegetables, fruits: for their animals: for their life.

 

Narration: [05:27 - 05:35] Sanel Riđanović is also a member of the coalition. An ecology professor, he has investigated how small dams impact freshwater ecosystems.

 

Sanel Riđanović: [05:35 - 05:49] Those projects, they are devastating for the ecosystems, particularly aquatic systems. If the river dries up, even for a short time, that actually destroys all the animals that live in the river.

 

Narration: [05:49 - 06:01] The majority of small dams in Bosnia pass rivers through tubes, drying out portions of the riverbeds. According to Riđanović, this spells disaster for species that can only be found in certain Bosnian streams, brooks, and creeks.

 

Sanel Riđanović: [06:01 - 06:07] So this is a Softmouth Trout, the species that will be possibly extinct if they build mini hydro plants.

 

Narration: [06:08 - 06:14] The threat to species like the Softmouth Trout is what prompted Ri-john-oh-vitch to not only research Bosnia’s rivers but to protect them.

 

Sanel Riđanović: [06:15 - 06:36] It's my responsibility to protect fish, passing on the knowledge on my students, on the local community and raising awareness about this species that can be gone in the next few years if we don't do something urgently.

 

Narration: [06:36 - 06:59] Professor Riđanović’s university is in Mostar, a city that remains deeply divided both culturally and geographically – the Neretva River divides the city between Bosniaks and Croats. Riđanović is a Bosniak: at the Buna Channel, only a few miles south of Mostar, he has joined forces with Oliver Arapović, a Croat. In 2016, an investor submitted plans to build two small dams along the channel.

 

[07:00 - 07:04] After a yearslong fight, activists prompted the government to stop the construction of both dams.

 

Oliver Arapović: [07:06 - 07:12] War didn't bring anything good to anyone. Normal people don't have any prejudice towards each other.

 

Narration: [07:13 - 07:35] The fight to preserve Bosnia’s rivers dates back to 2006, when the country aligned its energy policy to that of the European Union as part of its post-war membership bid. Afterwards, Bosnia pledged to reduce its reliance on coal. So, the Bosnian government introduced subsidies for hydropower projects. Government money made small dams attractive for investors and politicians, who persuaded locals of their benefits.

 

Lejla Kusturica: [07:35 - 07:52] They said the small hydro was going to change their local communities for better. Several years later, people started realizing that the rivers were just disappearing. The forest was disappearing, and they realized that they were sold lies.

 

Narration: [07:52 - 08:09] In response, a national movement erupted, and protests broke out across Bosnia. In 2017, the police violently confronted protesters in a small village as they blocked the only bridge to where investors planned to construct a dam. Years later, other communities in Bosnia have had to continue to fight.

 

Ermin Hondo: [08:09 - 08:16] We are born and raised here basically on the banks of this river. And we simply, we simply feel it as a part of ourselves. 

 

Narration: [08:16 - 08:32] Ermin Hondo, a 29-year-old who works in tech, lives in Konjic, a small Bosniak—or Muslim—majority city. As a child, he drove with his family every summer to the Neretvica, a river on which a public electricity company wants to construct a significant network of 15 dams.

 

Ermin Hondo: [08:32 - 08:58] Right now we are going to Buturović Polje. That's the largest village that is close to river Neretvica. A lot of people will complain about the state, about the political situation and stuff. But I think that 95% of people living in Bosnia is proud to be living in such a beautiful country.

 

Narration: [09:02 - 09:12] For four generations, Hondo’s family has owned a plot of land on the Neretvica’s banks. His father, who recently passed away, built a vacation house along the river with the intention of passing it on to Hondo.

  

Ermin Hondo: [09:13 - 09:19] I cannot think of any bigger dream for myself than to make the same for my kids, for my children. 

 

Narration: [09:20 - 09:25] To preserve the river that neighbors his family’s vacation home, Hondo has banded together with activists young and old.

 

Ibrahim Turak: [09:25 - 09:32] Here in this area, we have a lot of agriculture on which we depend, so we need water, and our lives depend on this river.

 

Narration: [09:33 - 09:53] Ibrahim Turak, a farmer who lives less than two miles from the Neretvica, is the president of this group of activists from neighboring villages, which goes by “Let Me Flow.” In June 2021, he joined hundreds of other community members—and a well-known Bosnian band—to prevent construction on one of the 15 planned small dams on the Neretvica.

 

Ibrahim Turak: [09:54  - 10:04] At this place, on this bridge, people gathered and stood their ground waiting for the machines to come. We let them get to a certain point just to tell them that they couldn't go through.

 

Narration: 10:04  - 10:10] The workers demanded to pass, but the activists, including double-amputee Safet Sarelić, blocked the road.

 

Safet Sarajlić: [10:10  - 10:18] They started coming at me, and I didn't let them through. My wheelchair was stronger than their machines.

 

Narration: [10:19  - 10:31] That day, Turak and Sarajlić prevailed. And just a few months later, the courts canceled the electricity company’s construction rights, once activists discovered that the small dams did not have energy permits. Now, they are fighting the investors in court.

 

Ermin Hondo: [10:32  - 10:42] They see that people here are quite prepared to do everything that's needed to defend the river. And I think that right now momentum is on our side.

 

Narration: [10:43  - 11:07] Despite the activists' wins, bringing small dams to Bosnia’s rivers remains a deeply desirable plan for some investors, including Edhem Bičakčić, a former prime minister of Bosnia who was pushed out of power after corruption charges. He has a degree in engineering and once led one of Bosnia’s public electricity companies. Now, he owns a private renewable energy business that specializes in the construction and design of wind farms, solar energy plants, and dams.

 

[11:07  - 11:12] His company has helped construct or design 55 small dams so far in Bosnia.

 

Edhem Bičakčić: [11:13  - 11:26] The potential Bosnia has in water, sun and wind is an opportunity for development. And the construction of a large number of facilities for renewable energy is a chance that Bosnia should use.

 

Narration: [11:27  - 11:44] Bičakčić admits some small dams are improperly, even illegally, constructed. Still, he feels criticism from abroad, including from the U.S. ambassador in Bosnia for small dams planned on the Neretvica, is equivalent to discouraging development in a nation still scarred by war.

 

Edhem Bičakčić: [11:44  - 11:56] This should help because it strengthens the economy of Bosnia and develops sustainable businesses. And it strengthens the renewable energy capacity that is necessary here and needed to accord with European standards.

 

Narration: [11:57  - 12:21] Activists argue that the electricity produced by small dams is miniscule compared to the power generated through solar or wind energy. For years, they lobbied for a law that suspends the ability of investors to receive energy permits for small dams. This summer, in one of the largest victories yet for the river activists, politicians passed the legislation, which effectively outlaws small dams in a significant portion of Bosnia.

 

Edhem Bičakčić: [12:23  - 12:31] I think that this is nonsense and stupidity. And if I could choose, I would get rid of the government that proposed it. I think no further comment is needed.

 

Narration: [12:32  - 12:52] Because of these activists’ efforts, the Buna Channel, and other waterways in Bosnia, still run free. And on its banks is where Tuševljak and her friends, Turak and Sarelić, Riđanović and Arapović—all representing different ethnicities and communities around the country—strategized for next steps in their fight against the spread of small dams.

 

In a country rife with corruption, [12:53  - 13:15] they know that even the most recent law that suspends the construction of dams along many of Bosnia’s rivers can be outmaneuvered. As the meeting pushed into the late afternoon, they then worked together to pull plastic from bushes, pluck styrofoam from the ground, and roll discarded tires to the trash, hoping to preserve the Buna Channel—and all of Bosnia’s rivers—for generations to come.