A weekend of protests is looming in Montenego, where the new head of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Montenegro is due to be inaugurated in the country’s former capital Cetinje. 

The inauguration of Metropolitan Bishop Joanikije II will go ahead in Cetinje despite the threatened protests, public broadcaster RTCG reported on August 25.

A few days earlier, thousands of Montenegrins protested against the inauguration that is scheduled for September 5. The location of the ceremony was raised by protesters as a threat of Serbian hegemony.

Joanikije II is to succeed the Serbian church’s previous most senior cleric in Montenegro, Metropolian Bishop Amfilohije, who died in October of coronavirus (COVID-19). The inauguration ceremony will be held in Cetinje Monastery, which is believed to be the historic cradle of Montenegrin statehood.

Opposition leaders say more protests will follow. Draginja Vuksanović-Stanković an MP from the opposition Social Democratic Party (SDP) said the previous protest sent a clear message from Cetinje “that clero-nationalist and fascist politics have no place in civil, multiethnic and European Montenegro”. 

“The Cetinje Monastery belongs to the descendants of those who fought for the freedom and is part of Montenegro, and not to those who want to occupy it and draw it into the Serbian world,” Vuksanović-Stanković said in a television interview, according to a party statement. 

Montenegro peacefully seceded from its loose union with Serbia in 2006. Two-thirds of its population of around 620,000 is Orthodox Christian and the main church is the Serbian Orthodox Church.

A separate Montenegrin Orthodox Church was set up in 1993 but has not been recognised by other Orthodox Christian communities to date. The local branch of the Serbian Orthodox Church controls most holy sites, some of which are popular among tourists and bring in significant revenue.

The role of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Montenegro is a contentious political issue. The former ruling party, President Milo Djukanovic’s Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS) tried to rein in the powers of the church with the controversial church law adopted in December 2019. The law also sparked protests from adherents of the church, as according to its critics it aimed to strip the Serbian Orthodox Church of hundreds of religious sites in Montenegro, including medieval monasteries and churches.

The situation escalated in August 2020, when a convoy of Serbian Orthodox Church clerics headed from Belgrade to the Jabuka monastery on the border with Montenegro in protest against the law. 

The law was amended the change of government in 2020, removing the articles that provoked objections from the Serbian Orthodox Church and led to increased tensions between Montenegro and Serbia. The new government is a broad coalition of small parties, including several pro-Serbian parties. 

The DPS said the government's attempt to hold the event in Cetinje that would “represent the greatest security risk in the modern history of Montenegro”, saying it “only encourages the worst chauvinistic aspirations and encourages rabid nationalists.” The party also criticised those who threatened to use violence in Cetinje, raising the issue of “horrific threats” made on social networks. 

“We are amazed by the incredible examples of hate speech and we hope that the authors, who wrote under their own names and surnames, will be sanctioned in accordance with the law,” the party said.