The elections held in Serbia ended with the victory of outgoing president Aleksandar Vucic and the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) to which he belongs. The non-governmental organization CESID, which took part in the count, has announced that Vucic has obtained 59.8 percent of the votes and will avoid the ballot.
The SNS won 43.8 per cent of the votes which, added to the 11.6 per cent of the Socialist allies, will guarantee him a parliamentary majority. “United for Serbia”, the main opposition coalition, stopped at 12 per cent while the left of “Moramo” did not reach 5 per cent. The second place in the presidential elections went to former general Zdravko Ponos, with 17 percent of the vote. The Electoral Commission said Vucic is the winner and voter turnout was 60 percent.
Aleksandar Vucic grew up politically alongside leaders such as Vojislav Seselj and Slobodan Milosevic, guilty of the atrocities in the Balkan wars of the 1990s but then openly denied his past by putting aside nationalism and opening decisively to economic reforms and the European Union .
In 2008 he left the ultra-nationalist Serbian Radical Party and founded the Progressive, populist and conservative Party, becoming its president starting from 2012. During his long political career he held various positions: Minister of Information between 1998 and 2000 , Minister of Defense between 2012 and 2013, Prime Minister from 2014 to 2017 and later Head of State. During the health emergency caused by Covid-19 Vucic has assumed all powers in its own hands, reserving the right to approve or overrule all the measures issued by the government. In some cases he took advantage of the situation by favoring the adoption of populist measures such as economic aid lump sum equal to 100 euros donated to all adult citizens.
The American non-governmental organization Freedom House reports that, in recent years, the SNS has progressively eroded political rights and civil liberties in the Balkan country by putting pressure on independent media, civil society and political opposition. The latter, in fact, expressed concern about the favorable treatment that the national media have reserved for Vucic, a constant presence in the main newspapers and on the most important Serbian televisions. Borko Stefanovic, vice-president of the Freedom and Justice Party, declared, as reported by the BBC, that the government “has absolute control of the media.” During the election campaign, the representatives of the executive benefited from abundant television coverage, equal to two-thirds-three-quarters of the time devoted to political news. The opposition, however, remained the crumbs.
Vucic’s opponents had chosen to boycott the 2020 parliamentary elections because they believed the conditions were lacking to make that challenge free and competitive but also the consultations of 2022 took place in an anomalous climate. The war in Ukraine dominated the election campaign and President Vucic took advantage of geopolitical developments by emphasizing the need for peace and discouraging the electorate from opting for change in difficult times. Vucic sided in favor of Ukraine’s territorial integrity and voted in favor of the UN resolution condemning the invasion. His overall position, however, is more nuanced. Belgrade opposed sanctions against Russia and did not close the country’s airspace to flights from Moscow.
In recent years, Serbia has maintained a facade neutrality in the context of the growing rivalry between the West and Russia, siding, from time to time, in favor of one or the other side for utilitarian reasons. The signing of the Association and Stabilization Agreement with the European Union requires Serbia to align its foreign and security policy with that of Brussels, but the country continues to be politically linked to Russia. Belgrade needs Moscow’s support on the Kosovo issue at the United Nations and is dependent on cheap supplies of gas and military equipment from Russia. A recent poll by the European Council on Foreign Relations found that 54 percent of Serbs see Russia as an ally while only 11 percent believe the European Union is.
Serbia intends to join the European Union and its accession talks were opened in 2014. However, the progress and steps forward recorded have met with currently insurmountable obstacles. Belgrade, with its allies Russia and China, refuses to recognize Kosovo’s 2008 declaration of independence but Brussels has announced that the normalization of relations between Kosovo and Serbia are an essential part of the process of rapprochement with the Union. The wounds of the secession of Pristina and the NATO bombings of 1999 are, however, still open and it seems unlikely that they can be overcome in the short term.
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