The Students Toppled Vučić, but Serbia's New Government Has to Wait: Voting Will Be Repeated at 53 Polling Stations

Serbia's students toppled Vučić in the 25 October election, but the new government will have to wait a little longer. The Republic Electoral Commission (RIK) decided to rerun the vote on Sunday, 1 November, at 53 polling stations where results couldn't be determined or the vote was annulled.

The maths is simple. At those 53 stations, 24,438 people are eligible to vote, while the student list leads by more than 582,000 votes. The rerun can't change the result, only delay it. According to RIK, with 97.56 percent of polling stations counted, the "Students Are Winning" list took 2,267,615 votes, or 52.71 percent, and should get 140 seats in parliament. The "Aleksandar Vučić - United Serbia" list has 1,685,022 votes, or 39.17 percent, which gives it 104 seats. Turnout was 68.78 percent, and Vučić conceded defeat on election night.

Here's the most interesting detail. At every parliamentary election since 2014, Vučić's SNS has won between 1.63 and 1.82 million votes, with the exception of the 2020 Covid election, when part of the opposition boycotted and the party got close to 2 million. Now it has 1.685 million - right inside its usual range. Vučić didn't lose his voters. He lost everyone else, whom the students managed to bring together in one place.

The deadlines are long. Once final results are declared, there are 30 days to hold the inaugural session of parliament, and after the mandates are confirmed, another 90 days to elect a government. If every deadline is used to the full, the new government could take up to four months. In parallel, Serbia must also hold an early presidential election by the end of the year: Vučić resigned on 27 September, so the vote must take place by 28 December at the latest.

The students in blockade announced a press conference at noon today in Pionirski Park in Belgrade, without saying what it's about. The location is no accident. This is the former "Ćacilend", the tent camp of Vučić supporters that stood there for nearly two years. On election night, citizens removed the fences and tents, and the next day the park was cleaned up and reopened. A space that was fenced off for the government for two years is now open to everyone.

In Serbia, as across the region, governments clung for years to the mantra of "stability". That mantra now has an expiry date. The real test, though, only begins when the students from the street sit down in the ministries. Will they stay what they were on the street?