Serbia Votes Tomorrow With a Student List Level Against Vucic
Serbia holds parliamentary elections on Sunday, with a movement grown out of almost two years of anti-corruption protests mounting the most serious challenge to the governing party since it took office in 2012. Its 250 candidates have no political background, and the list has no leader.
The protests began after 16 people died when a railway station canopy collapsed at Novi Sad, and the candidates were chosen by university faculty assemblies rather than by a party. The list is headed by a cardiologist who would not necessarily become prime minister, since the movement has deliberately refused a hierarchy. A reported 150,000 supporters attended its final rally in Belgrade on Thursday night. Aleksandar Vucic stood down as president in order to run again as prime minister, and has cast the movement as foreign-backed and bent on bringing down the state. The candidate at the top of the student list framed it as restoration rather than rupture: “We offer to our citizens the core values of civilised society, which this previous regime has taken away from our citizens.” Reliable polling is scarce and analysts expect an extremely tight result. The thing to watch is whether a movement with no leader and no machine can convert street numbers into seats — and whether the governing party accepts the count if it cannot.