Poor Pompeia

Since June, Josip Broz Tito's third wife, Jovanka, has been missing from the aging (85) President's side. Ill health? Marital problems? Last week party officials were whispering to Western journalists in Belgrade that Jovanka was, in fact, in big political trouble. Unbeknownst to Tito, Jovanka had allegedly overstepped her position by lobbying for the promotion of Serbian officers who were close friends from her home district of Lika. That kind of politicking is unsettling in Yugoslavia, where traditional friction between Serbs and Croats may pose a danger to national unity when Tito dies.

Jovanka was reported to be under house arrest in the presidential residence. Party officials said Tito had approved the investigation of her lobbying, and, obviously, he would decide on her punishment. That might be mild or firm. As one Yugoslav editor commented last week, "Caesar's wife must be beyond reproach. At least that's how Caesar feels."

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