Why is the president of Serbia wasting precious time, which he could use for "new economic and political feats", on a charade called "consultations for the election of a new president of the Government of Serbia," even commentators on portals close to the government ask.
Others, ordinary bots, reply that Vučić wants to "listen to the arguments of all parliamentary parties" and make a "wise", "statesmanlike decision" based on that. But surely they seem comical and boring to themselves as they type this, and their fingers are cramping over the keyboard with hypocrisy. Even for those with the cheapest tickets, who watch the political match from the top of the stands and cannot tell whether basketball or volleyball is being played on the court, it is clear that the decision on the new president and the composition of the government will be made by Vučić himself after consulting with himself. The president, and it is clear, has a rich inner life.
Legal obligation and criteria
Of course, those who best present obedience and loyalty, who are ready to brutally trample everything under them in order to protect and develop the businesses of the family in power and the interests of business and criminal circles connected to it, will be chosen. There will also be a little intra-party and inter-party trade, and it will be seen that the interests of some powerful countries are satisfied as much as possible.
Consultations are a constitutional and legal obligation of the president, but no one would be excited if he skipped them. In any case, every day before morning coffee, he violates the Constitution three times, and he uses laws - like Nikola Pašić - only "for opponents". However, you should use every opportunity to portray yourself in the media as some kind of great statesman.
Consultations should also be seen in the context of what seems to be an important process. They differ from the previous, also senseless Vučić's post-election "reconciliations", because they represent a segment of the unification of the regime's political forces. Although the opposition is routinely attacked with all weapons, it seems that currently Vučić and company are more dedicated to the inner life of the governing parties, through an attempt to implement the several-year-old idea of a "broad movement for the people and the state". The idea of a movement (with one leader) is evidently a consequence of the dramatic decline in the popularity of SNS, which was replaced by the biggest election theft in, in this sense, the rich recent history of Serbia, as well as the need to use narratives about patriots and traitors more aggressively.
Of course, this is part of the Putinization aspirations.
Subjugation of the SPS
I guess no one even politically literate will be surprised when part of the "movement" formally becomes the phantom party "Zavetnici", created in the basements shared by the SNS and the "service", or that Dragan Marković Palma, who is always easy to buy or blackmail, will join it. . The main battle is about whether Vučić will finally succeed in swallowing the SPS, a party with which he has successfully cooperated for 11 years and which he is constantly, even undisguisedly, trying to destroy, given that they are targeting the same electorate.
Dacic is squirming about joining the "movement", because it is clear to him that this would be the end of his party. There is also great resistance within the party. Some of his local committees, after these elections (after which nothing will be the same, as they say), publicly showed their desire to form a coalition with the parties gathered around Serbia against violence, but the sheriffs from the headquarters forbade them to do so.
By the way, the progressives achieved greater success in these elections than before, and the SPS fell, because the "people from Dačić" were prevented from "doing" their usual "electoral engineering". Thus, one, not a small number of their votes went to SNS.
Consultative farce
The opposition has every right to refuse to participate in the consultative farce. It would not make sense to go to Vučić even if such a drastic and, finally, clearly proven election theft had not happened. Any conversation with Vučić is pointless, it can only confuse the already systematically served opposition voters.
I guess Dragan Đilas also realized this, after meeting Vučić after the previous elections in April 2022, when he asked the "master" to repeat the elections in Belgrade. By the way, the opposition should be aware that the citizens of the "inside" are annoyed by the continuous focus on the Belgrade elections, even though it is clear that the opposition has the best chance of victory in the capital.
There is no doubt that the opposition has achieved great success by internationalizing election theft. However, one could blame them for not having worked on it before, given that it is clear that none of the elections in Serbia since 2014 have been regular. But well, better never than never.
The parties gathered around "Serbia against violence" claimed that they will fight for the repeat of the elections on three fronts: through domestic institutions, through protests and through animating the international community. It seems that the third plan "dominated". That in itself is not bad, because it can be effective. It is clear that domestic institutions should not be counted on, but they cannot be bypassed either. However, a serious question remains: what about the protests? It's clear that voters are angry, but why aren't they on the streets?
Perhaps the reason for this lies in the fact that the opposition parties also have too rich an inner life. Once again, they spend a lot of energy on mutual exaggeration, subterfuge and positioning, and it can be seen no matter how much it is hidden. Sometimes it seems that citizens and Vučić's regime are in the background.
