Follow-up: With Almost 99 Percent Counted in Serbia, Student List on 52.7 Percent and 139 Seats, Ruling Alliance on 97
Serbia woke on Monday, October 26, to a new era after a student-backed protest movement unseated longtime leader Aleksandar Vucic in a landslide election that sparked nationwide celebrations. With almost 99 percent of votes counted, the students' candidates had secured 52.7 percent of the vote, according to the State Election Commission, versus 39.2 percent for Vucic's Serbia Progressive Party (SNS)-led alliance, Reuters reported. That gives the students 139 seats in the 250-seat parliament, leaving the SNS alliance with 97, and the remainder held by minority parties. Vucic had conceded defeat late on Sunday, projecting from his party's sample that the Student List would take 135 to 140 seats against about 105 for his side; the near-complete count puts the ruling alliance lower, at 97 seats.
Tens of thousands took to the streets of Belgrade and other cities and towns after the concession, capping two years of peaceful anti-government protests. 'I thought it was unbelievable, I still do not believe it. It was too long, and (Vucic) was pressuring us for a long, long time,' said university administrator Marijana Radovanovic Pajovic. Insurance worker Svetlana Karagkozidou, 60, said she hoped the corruption that 'has entered into all pores of our lives' would slowly change. Not everyone welcomed the shift: civil worker Senka Radakovic, 60, said she did not like the country changing 'so suddenly and all at once,' and did not know who stood behind the new leaders.
The students' win was born out of anti-corruption protests following the deaths of 16 people in the collapse of a train station canopy in Novi Sad in 2024. The movement's candidates include university professors, actors and farmers, with prominent figures including list head cardiologist Ilija Srdanovic, former central bank governor Dejan Soskic and Belgrade University professor Radomir Sajcic. But the movement has no clear leaders, and it is unclear who it will appoint as prime minister and to other key positions to enact an agenda aimed at rooting out graft and improving schooling. Vucic dominated Serbian politics as prime minister or president from 2014; he and the SNS have repeatedly denied accusations of repression and corruption.
Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 位于贝尔格莱德的塞尔维亚国民议会大厦（资料图）。Rudolph A. Furtado 摄，CC0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / The House of the National Assembly of Serbia in Belgrade (file photo). Photo by Rudolph A. Furtado, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons.
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- 2026-10-27Follow-up: With Almost 99 Percent Counted in Serbia, Student List on 52.7 Percent and 139 Seats, Ruling Alliance on 97This story
