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Serbia Votes in High-Stakes Parliamentary Election
· Confirmed
In Short: Serbia held a parliamentary election on Sunday, with high turnout expected among the 6.4 million registered voters.
The snap vote was called by President Aleksandar Vucic last month, citing 'major turbulence on the domestic political scene.' It follows nearly two years of student-led protests sparked by the 2024 collapse of a canopy at Novi Sad railway station, which killed 16 people.
The disaster triggered some of Serbia's largest protests since the fall of strongman Slobodan Milosevic in 2000. The final pre-election rally in Belgrade on Thursday drew around 150,000 people, according to an independent protest monitor.
Eighteen electoral lists are vying for seats in Serbia's 250-member parliament, but polls suggest the contest is largely a choice between the ruling party and the student-backed list. The Students' List is calling for an end to the current regime via the ballot box.
In the decades since Milosevic fell, when around 70 percent cast ballots to oust him, parliamentary turnout has declined, averaging just above 55 percent during SNS rule. However, an unusually high turnout is expected this time.
Voters queued at polling places around the country early Sunday, with local election monitors reporting that turnout in the first three hours of voting was more than double what it had been in the last parliamentary election in 2023. Videos posted online showed Serbs abroad turning out to vote, from singing and dancing in the streets of Los Angeles to celebrations in a Toronto bar in the early hours.
Days before the vote, Serbian civil society groups warned that conditions for 'free and fair elections' were lacking. Local elections earlier this year in 10 municipalities in Serbia saw violent attacks on journalists and activists.
The commission said by 10 am almost 20 percent had already cast ballots compared to 9.94 percent in the 2023 elections. By 17:00 GMT, voter turnout had reached 64.9 percent, the highest since the breakup of Yugoslavia in 1992.
The Students' List movement is taking on authoritarian leader Aleksandar Vucic following nearly two years of protests against government and institutional corruption. The movement hopes to oust him from office in snap parliamentary elections.
The election is the culmination of nearly two years of student-led protests sparked by the 2024 collapse of a canopy at Novi Sad railway station that killed 16 people, a tragedy widely blamed on corruption. The disaster evolved from demands for a transparent investigation into the Novi Sad tragedy into calls for an early election.
The Students' List is calling for an end to the current regime in Serbia via the ballot box in Sunday's parliamentary election. The movement is taking on authoritarian leader Vucic following nearly two years of protests against government and institutional corruption.
The Students' List is expected to reclaim the parliamentary majority, with 129 out of 250 seats. The election is the biggest challenge to Vucic's rule for more than a decade.
Voters queued at polling places around the country early Sunday, with voter Aida Rodic saying that Sunday was 'a special day for me.'
What this adds
The election comes amid concerns about the safety and fairness of the campaign, marked by detentions, near-total government control over the media, and reports of surveillance and cyberattacks against activists.
What's confirmed
- The snap vote is the culmination of nearly two years of student-led protests sparked by the 2024 collapse of a canopy at Novi Sad railway station that killed 16 people -- a tragedy widely blamed on corruption.
- Polls opened in Serbia on Sunday in what is set to be its most fiercely contested parliamentary election in more than 14 years, as a student-led movement seeks to oust the party of veteran leader Aleksandar Vucic.
- The snap parliamentary elections, called by Vucic in September, come after almost two years of student-led demonstrations against perceived corruption and creeping authoritarianism triggered by the deaths of 16 people when a train station canopy collapsed in the city of Novi Sad in 2024.
- Serbia is voting on Sunday as a mass student protest movement seeks to unseat long-time populist leader Aleksandar Vučić in the biggest challenge to his rule for more than a decade.
- Voters queued at polling places around the country early Sunday as local election monitors said turnout in the first three hours of voting was more than a double what it had been in the last parliamentary election in 2023.
- While the increasingly authoritarian Vucic has routinely outplayed Serbia's fractured opposition in the past, the leaderless youth movement has proved to be a tough opponent that rattled his firm grip on power in Serbia like no one else could in the 14 years since his party took office.
- Though Serbia's 6.4 million voters get to choose from 18 parties hoping to enter the 250-member Parliament, the election has taken shape as a referendum between Vucic's right-wing Serbian Progressive Party and the youth-backed Students' List.
- Local elections earlier this year in 10 municipalities in Serbia saw violent attacks on journalists and activists.
- "I hope that this day will pass in a democratic atmosphere and in peace and that we will legitimately choose a new government in Serbia," Srdanovic said.
- Recent elections have been marred by irregularities and the European Union is watching closely the conduct of Sunday's vote in a candidate nation for the bloc's membership.
- Both international and local election monitors already have expressed concern about the safety and fairness of an election campaign marked by detentions, near-total government control over the media and reports of surveillance and cyberattacks against activists.
- "this evening, when we present our results, we will give recommendations what to do next."
What's still developing
- "Serbia is awakening. You have been and remain our strength. It is time to redirect that strength toward freedom," it said in a letter posted on X.
- Aleksandar Vucic says Serbia is deepening ties with Washington while balancing relations with Russia and China, standing by Israel and resisting calls to recognize Kosovo.
- Serbia's last election, in 2023, was followed by protests after international observers reported irregularities including bussing in voters from neighboring Bosnia-Hercegovina and voter intimidation.
- The vote comes six months after Radev’s party won a landslide parliamentary victory, securing a rare single-party majority and raising concerns among opponents about the concentration of political power.
- All of this is culminating in the parliamentary election, which will determine the makeup of the region’s first legislative body.
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