Serbia’s long-time leader Aleksandar Vučić has admitted defeat to a student-led protest movement in snap parliamentary elections, ending more than a decade of dominance by his Serbian Progressive Party (SNS). Speaking at SNS headquarters in Belgrade late on Sunday, the right-wing populist said final results were not yet in but the outcome was plain. “It is clear that we have lost these elections,” he said.
Preliminary figures from the election commission pointed to record turnout, with 64.9 percent of voters having cast ballots by 18:00 local time, two hours before polls closed. Commentators had suggested high participation would favour the student movement. Long queues formed at polling stations across Serbia and in cities with large Serbian communities abroad, including Ljubljana, Munich, Paris, Los Angeles and Chicago.
Vučić called the vote after two years of protests triggered by the collapse of a railway station canopy in Novi Sad, which killed 16 people. The disaster came to symbolise corruption and negligence. Having served two terms as president, he could not seek a third and had led the SNS campaign hoping to return as prime minister, a post he left in 2017. Celebrations erupted across the country after his concession, with crowds dancing, chanting “victory” and setting off fireworks in Belgrade and Novi Sad. “Serbia is free,” one student told the BBC. “It’s a miracle.”
The Student List, which has no obvious leaders, fielded doctors, actors, academics and sports figures for the 250-seat parliament. Its manifesto promised to purge officials who cracked down on protesters, bar party loyalists from leading public enterprises and free the public broadcaster from political control. Lead candidate Ilija Srdanović said: “This will be a free state.” Candidate Radomir Saicic told supporters that no force could forever overpower a people determined to take their destiny into their own hands. Vučić and the SNS have repeatedly denied corruption allegations.
