Moša Pijade

Moša Pijade
5th President of the Federal Assembly of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
In office 29 January 1954 – 15 March 1957
Preceded by	Milovan Djilas
Succeeded by	Petar Stambolic
Personal details
Born	(1890-01-04)4 January 1890 Belgrade, Kingdom of Serbia
Died	Paris, France
Nationality	Yugoslav
Political party	League of Communists of Yugoslavia (SKJ)
Spouse(s)	Lepa Pijade
Occupation	Painter, Art critic, Publicist, Revolutionary, Resistance commander, Statesman
Awards	Order of the People's Hero Order of the Hero of Socialist Labour Order of the brotherhood and unity Order of the partisan star Order of the National liberation Order for courageousness
Ethnicity	Sephardi Jewish
Military service
Allegiance	Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
Service/branch	Yugoslav People's Army
Rank	Major General of Yugoslav People's Army
Commands	Yugoslav Partisans Yugoslav People's Army
Battles/wars	World War II

Moša Pijade (Serbian Cyrillic: Мoшa Пиjaдe; 4 January 1890 – 15 March 1957), nicknamed Čiča Janko (Чича Јанко, lit. "Uncle Janko") was a prominent Serbian and Yugoslav communist, a close collaborator of Josip Broz Tito, former President of Yugoslavia, and full member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts.

Life and career

Moša Pijade as a political prisoner.

Pijade was of Sephardic Jewish parentage. In his youth, Pijade was a painter, art critic and publicist. He was also known for translating Das Kapital by Karl Marx into Serbo-Croatian. He is thought to have had a major influence on Marxist ideology as exposed during the old regime in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. In 1925, he was sentenced to 20 years in prison because of his 'revolutionary activities' after World War I. He was discharged after 14 years in 1939 and imprisoned again in 1941 in the camp Bileća.

Pijade was one of the leaders of the Uprising in Montenegro.

Pijade was known as the creator of the so-called 'Foča regulations' (1942), which prescribed the foundation and activity of people's liberation committees in the liberated territories during the war against the Nazis. In November 1943, before the second AVNOJ meeting in Jajce, he initiated the foundation of Tanjug, which later became the state news agency of SFR Yugoslavia, nowadays of Serbia.

Pijade held high political posts during and after World War II and was a member of the Central Committee and the Politburo of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia. He was one of the leaders of Tito's partisans and was subsequently proclaimed People's Hero of Yugoslavia. He was one of six Vice Presidents of the Presidium of the Yugoslavian Parliament (deputy head of state) 1945–53.

In 1948 Pijade convinced Tito to allow those Jews who remained in Yugoslavia to emigrate to Israel. Tito agreed on a one-time exception basis. As a result, 3,000 Jews were allowed to emigrate from Yugoslavia to Israel on the SS Kefalos in December 1948. Among those was Tommy Lapid who became Deputy Prime Minister of Israel and is the father of Yair Lapid.

After having led the law commission of the Parliament, Pijade was Vice-President (1953–54) and President of the Yugoslavian Parliament or Skupština (1954–55). In 1957, he died in Paris during the return from a visit to London, where he had talks as leader of a Yugoslav parliamentary delegation.

Streets in many cities of the former Yugoslav countries were once named after him.

See also

• Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
• Titoism
• Collectivism
• Josip Broz Tito
• Partisans (Yugoslavia)
• Milovan Đilas
• Edvard Kardelj

References

• Sephardic Jews and Communism