"Good Father"

At 86, Tito still rules

The opening date had been chosen with care: exactly 30 years after fiercely independent Yugoslavia was expelled from Joseph Stalin's Cominform for what became known as "Titoism." Many things have changed since then, but not the enduring presence of Yugoslav President Josip Broz Tito himself. Last week, as 2,300 delegates from the Balkan federation's League of Communists and observers from 63 foreign Communist parties (including the Soviet Union's) met in Belgrade for the country's eleventh national party congress, the official four-day agenda seemed of secondary importance. Overshadowing everything was the figure of the crafty former World War II resistance leader--and the fact that at 86, Tito surely will not be around to lead much longer.

The subject never came up at the congress, of course, where delegates dutifully sang the hagiographic ditty, Comrade Tito, We Swear that We Will Not Deviate from Your Line. Nor did Tito give a hint that he was anything but eternal. His hair still a perky shade of red, and looking tanned and relaxed in a jaunty, Palm Beach-style cream-colored suit, Tito delivered an hour-long series of excerpts from a 92-page policy address that was remarkable for its globe-spanning comprehensiveness--plus, in certain respects, its blandness. He soberly warned of the dangers of a new world war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. Tito lectured party stalwarts on the need to raise productivity in Yugoslavia's worker-manager system of socialism. As for the country's future, he magisterially declared that any speculation was "really ridiculous and senseless. We look to tomorrow with confidence and optimism."

Actually, the congress accomplished one thing relevant to Tito's serene prospect. It rubber-stamped a revamping of the Communist league's leadership, reducing the party's presidium from 48 to 24 members and confirming Slovene Stane Dolanc, 52, as its secretary. Thus Dolanc was reappointed as a member of Tito's inner circle of advisers, and in the long term, he could be a possible successor. In the short term, the front runner for Tito's title as President is Edvard Kardelj, 68, preeminent among eight members of Yugoslavia's collective state presidency and the party's chief theoretician. Kardelj, however, is ailing and may be no more than a prospective transitional figure.

But for the moment, Tito continues to rule as well as reign in Yugoslavia. He sees top party and government aides regularly. Matters involving foreign policy and the Yugoslav army are his personal domain. Says one Western diplomat in Belgrade: "He doesn't have to refer anything back to anyone for approval." Adds onetime Tito colleague Milovan Djilas: "His attitude is that of a good father."

Tito spends as little time as possible in the capital. His favorite summer retreat is the Adriatic island of Brioni, while his winters are spent at a cliffside villa in Igalo, on the southern tip of Yugoslavia. He still indulges his passion for hunting: last year the Yugoslav news agency Tanjug solemnly reported that he had shot the largest ibex ever killed in the Slovene mountains. He is also an inveterate movie watcher, favoring westerns and detective films. He lives alone, having a year ago banished from public view a third wife, Jovanka, 32 years his junior. She had apparently incurred Tito's displeasure by promoting the careers of army officers who shared her Serbian background. That kind of partisan behavior is anathema to Tito, a native Croatian, who has held together the six-nation Yugoslav coalition by sternly avoiding any appearance of ethnic favoritism.

Tito betrays his awareness of his own age only by his avoidance of funerals and by the elaborate circumlocutions he uses to refer to his eventual death (one favorite phrase is "when I am no longer in this place"). Despite their leader's calm attitude toward the future, many Yugoslavs view Tito's departure with apprehension. Their main concern: it will offer an opportunity for renewed Soviet pressure to bring the country back into Moscow-centered Communist orthodoxy. Yet there is one telling sign that Yugoslavs are steeling themselves for Tito's passing. His writings are being collected in a 60-volume series of works--the ultimate accolade for any figure about to join the pantheon of Marxist-Leninist saints.

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