About 150,000 supporters of Serbia’s opposition student movement rallied in central Belgrade on Thursday, seeking to oust the party of veteran leader Aleksandar Vucic in crunch parliamentary elections this weekend.
The Student List Movement
The Student List, a leaderless movement of student-backed candidates, aims to end more than 14 years of rule by Vucic’s rightwing populist Serbian Progressive party (SNS) in Sunday’s vote. Civil society groups have reported that the campaign has been marred by intimidation, arrests, and misuse of public resources.
““I came to support the Student List because young people finally gave me hope that it is possible to live in a normal country,” said Marija Nedeljkovic Radic, 47, as she arrived for the students’ rally. “Really, for the first time in my life, I believe that it is possible.”
Context of the Elections
Sunday’s vote follows nearly two years of student-led protests triggered by the 2024 collapse of a canopy at the newly renovated Novi Sad railway station, which resulted in the deaths of 16 people. This tragedy, widely attributed to corruption, sparked some of Serbia’s largest protests since the fall of Slobodan Milošević in 2000.
The anti-corruption movement, led by university students, evolved from demands for a transparent investigation into the tragedy into calls for an early election. Waving “Students are winning” flags, chanting, and blowing whistles, students and their supporters marched through Belgrade before converging on Slavija Square, a site of significant protests.
