According to the local newspapers, Motovun boasts of one-thousand and one inhabitant in this year’s census. A magical number, this. The one-thousand and first inhabitant must be no-one else but our mayor, who actually lives in Vrsar on the coast of Istria. Somehow he has kept his local address, albeit for political reasons only. Local newspapers also report that the Municipality of Motovun is one of many in Croatia that may vanish soon. The European Union is pressing the country to streamline its sprawling administration. Not enough people to warrant the throng of idle administrators, that is. I am not sure of their exact number in Motovun, but there are at least seven of them in the municipal office at present. Three or four of them are idle for true. Even though I am rather pleased that this travesty of administration is about to be snuffed out for good, I am starting to worry. Who will pay for the lawsuit lodged against me by the municipality, including its legal expenses? Indeed, one of the three make-believe lawsuits comes from the Municipality of Motovun itself. Although the mayor has cajoled or perhaps even forced his colleagues to join him in his legal shenanigans, he is likely to leave Motovun sometime soon. The magical number will in time suffer, too. It will shrink by at least one.

Addendum (October 19, 2016)

A couple of years after this piece was penned, the then mayor of Motovun lost his post in municipal elections (“A Revolution in Motovun,” May 19, 2013). The following year, he was also kicked out of the Municipal Council because it was determined that he actually lived in Vrsar (“False Address,” September 4, 2014). Even though everyone in the municipality knew this was the case, it took no less than a full-blown police investigation to put things right. Croatia in a nutshell. But the Municipality of Motovun is still there and kicking in spite of its risible size. Streamlining of the Croatian administration has not yet started in spite of the continuing pressure from the European Union. In short, the magical number has suffered as I predicted, but for a different reason. For better or worse, though, Motovun’s population will not be officially changed before the 2021 census.