Serbia votes as Vučić's coalition faces student-led list

Serbia holds early parliamentary elections on Sunday, 25 October, in which the Student List (Studentska Lista), which grew out of a two-year student protest movement, may pose the greatest threat yet to Aleksandar Vučić. He has dominated politics in the Balkan country since 2014, first as prime minister and later as president. This time he is running with United Serbia (Ujedinjena Srbija), a coalition led by his Serbian Progressive Party, Reuters reports.

The polls

Independent pollsters put the Student List ahead by 3 to 10 percentage points. The government-linked pollster Faktor Plus instead shows United Serbia leading, with 48.6% against 37.1%. Between 11% and 16% of respondents are undecided, and the outcome will largely depend on them.

The Student List platform promises honest politics, media freedom and a fight against corruption. It has no declared candidate for prime minister, has not stressed EU membership as a goal, opposes sanctions on Russia and says Kosovo is and will remain part of Serbia. Experts say it is unclear what the list would do in power.

How the protests began

The movement began after a canopy collapsed at the railway station in Novi Sad on 1 November 2024, killing 16 people. Protesters demanded that those responsible be punished and corruption, which they blamed for poor construction, be ended. Students blockaded university buildings in Belgrade and many residents backed them. In late January 2025, Prime Minister Miloš Vučević, a close ally of Vučić, resigned. In March, hundreds of thousands marched in Belgrade. The authorities tried to suppress the protests by discrediting them and blamed foreign countries.

Vučić dissolved parliament on 9 September and resigned as president on 27 September to run for prime minister. Regular elections were due by December next year.

End of the campaign

The Guardian writes that Vučić has stepped up ultranationalist rhetoric and tightened control over the media. In Niš he repeated that students are following instructions from abroad and promised to end politics in schools and universities. The student movement held a rally on Thursday at Belgrade's Slavija intersection.