Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic’s party has won the national elections by a landslide. This is despite opposition parties boycotting the polls and less than half of the electorate taking part.
According to preliminary reports, the ruling Serbian Progressive Party won by 63.5 per cent of the votes. Other parties that won seats in parliament include Ipsos and CeSID. Second place went to the Socialist Party-United coalition and third to the Serbian Patriotic Alliance.
These elections were the first on the European continent to be held since the COVID-19 pandemic and were dominated by Vuvic. His name was even on the ballot, despite the fact he was not a candidate in the elections.
President and leader of Serbian Progressive Party, Aleksandar Vucic, said that his party gained “huge trust from citizens, the highest ever in Serbia”.
“I have been in politics for a long time, but I have never experienced a moment like this, we have gained huge trust from the people, the greatest ever in Serbia, in conditions when few people believed in it,” Vucic said on Sunday evening at the SNS headquarters, after elections results came in.
The party will now hold 187 of 250 mandates in parliament.
The Albanian Democratic Alternative also won seats.
The coalition of parties that boycotted the elections also claimed success because less than 50% of the eligible voting population turned out. Alliance for Serbia said that with less than half of registered voters taking part, the government has no legitimacy.
A number of violations were noted in around 5% of polling stations. Incidents included submitting pre-prepared ballot papers and then collecting a second one from the polling station and returning it blank to the person that paid them. There were also cases of taking photos of ballots and party members tracking who voted or not. Those who were not allowed to vote were reportedly allowed to cast votes in the name of deceased people.
