Serbia votes Sunday as a student list challenges Vucic in a near-tied parliamentary election

Sunday's vote

Serbian voters go to the polls on Sunday, 25 October, to elect the 250 members of a new parliament. Polling stations open at 07:00 and close at 20:00 local time, and SKAI put the number of voters called to the polls at 6.45 million. The election was called early, instead of in 2027, after Aleksandar Vucic resigned as president on 27 September to lead the campaign for the prime ministership. Greek and Italian outlets describe the ballot as an informal referendum on his rule, which the articles put at between 12 and 14 years depending on the source. Vucic heads the Serbia United list, built around the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) and several smaller parties.

From a canopy collapse to a candidate list

The movement began after a canopy at the renovated railway station in Novi Sad collapsed on 1 November 2024, killing 16 people. Protesters pressed the government after the official investigation moved slowly, and the vigils turned into marches against corruption and a lack of transparency. Transport minister Goran Vesic resigned first, and the pressure that followed led prime minister Milos Vucevic to step down, according to La Razon. The Student List is led by Ilija Srdanovic, a cardiologist and professor in Novi Sad, and presents itself as a leaderless alliance formed through university plenary meetings. Its rules bar students themselves from standing and exclude former members of the 20 parties in the governing coalition as well as former officials of parliamentary opposition parties. Il Sole 24 ORE counts 250 candidates on the list, among them university professors, lawyers, farmers, doctors, civil society activists and business people.

Polls and fears of a disputed result

Greek outlets report that every poll shows a head-to-head contest with a gap of no more than two percentage points. La Razon describes the Student List as second in all polls, a short distance behind the Serbia United coalition. Analysts quoted by Nafternboriki worry that a margin this narrow could be contested and set off unrest the following day. Katarina Scepanovic, a 49-year-old English literature teacher in Belgrade who is fifth on the list, argues that polls understate the students because many people tell pollsters they will vote for Vucic. She says she relies more on what she has seen during the campaign in towns and villages across Serbia, where people have had enough. To Vima describes the movement as decentralised, with no single leader standing out, and warns that the vote carries a risk of regional destabilisation.

Accusations and international scrutiny

The governing party describes the students as foreign agents who, with help from foreign secret services, seek to break up the state, according to Greek reports. The students in turn accuse the authorities of vote buying, blackmail of voters, preventive arrests of activists and intimidation of citizens. Vucic has argued for months that the movement is a foreign-backed operation run through the opposition, and in March he said nothing the government did would be enough for the students because their aim was a colour revolution. The European Union says it is following developments closely and has asked that democratic principles be respected during the vote. International observers from the EU, the OSCE and the Council of Europe will monitor the electoral process.