Today, in spite of bad weather, around 1500 Croatian students protested for free university education in Zagreb. The protest were also to take place in the town of Pula where approximately 500 students gathered.

In Zagreb, the protest began at the Faculty of philosophy. From there the protesters went together towards the center of the town. The banners featured were: One world – one struggle – education is not for sale; EUtanasia of education; you have nothing to lose except tuition fees; profit =/= progress, privatization = robbery; knowledge is not a comodity; neoliberalism out of the university; money for education, not for war etc. The next stop was the museum of Mimara were the students of the Faculty of philosophy, which were the majority, met other students. There chanting began, a few ad hoc slogans were coined, and the president of one of Croatian labour unions spoke supporting our claims. The demands were: free education for all (today, almost 60% of students pay their own fees) and more finance for universities. The demands were directed to the government of Croatia and Croatian parliament. The protest was peaceful and with no incidents but very noisy - there were lots of slogans, singing and shouting. Everybody agrees that the atmosphere of the protest was very nice indeed. The slogan most often chanted was, of course: free education. The next stop was the house of the rectorate of Zagreb. There, one of the student leaders and organizers of the protest spoke demanding universal free education (including postgraduate studies) followed by loud cheering of the participants. The names of all other countries where the protests were organized were mentioned and greeted. After that students went to the Upper Town to the St. Catherine's Square where the main rally was to be held. The line of students chanting through the city was really impressive. The St. Catherine's Square was chosen because it is very close to the St. Mark's Square where the Croatian Government building is, which is forbidden for protests (though not for George Bush when he was in town recently). There, one of the other organizers spoke and the protest was over with a short concert by drummers and a rap singer. All in all, the protest went on for approximately three hours. This is not the end of the actions of Croatian students in their fight against neoliberalism at the university.

The protest was judged by all to be very successful, the students were all very satisfied and it was covered very well by the media (including the main news of the national TV-station). The biggest accomplishment of all was probably the fact that the possibility of free university education is now back in the public discourse. Up till recently it was not even mentioned as a real possibility. Now it is back with vengeance.