Based on 100 percent of the votes counted, CESID announced the results of the repeated extraordinary elections in Belgrade. The list "Aleksandar Vučić - Belgrade Tomorrow" won 64 out of 110 mandates, so it will finally be able to form the government on its own.
The difference compared to the so-called he can increase the real opposition if he includes the "Russian party - Serbs and Russians brothers forever" (2 mandates) and "MI strength of the people" in the city administration - prof. Dr. Branimir Nestorović" (9 mandates).
Night of shattered illusions
On the other side of the political spectrum, there has been a significant change in the balance of power. The new leader of the Belgrade opposition is Savo Manojlović, whose list "I am Belgrade - Move-Change" won 21 mandates. The coalition made up of six parties "Biramo Beograd - Dobrica Veselinović - Miloš Pavlović" led by the Green-Left Front, will have only 14 deputies. After a number of years, the "ducks" lost their primacy as the leading political alternative in Belgrade in the June 2 elections.
The conflict with the boycotters from "Serbia against violence" largely contributed to this. Dragan Đilas' Party of Freedom and Justice, Zdravko Ponoš's Serbia Center and Nebojša Zelenović's Together for Serbia disqualified themselves from the Belgrade match, but they also dragged their former coalition colleagues who decided to participate in the elections into the abyss of irrelevance in Belgrade. in the political boycott of the elections they saw surrender without any struggle.
Despite the good result in the emergency Belgrade elections on December 17 last year (6,3 percent), the NADA coalition led by Miloš Jovanović's New DSS decided not to participate in the repeated emergency Belgrade elections on June 2 due to equally bad election conditions.
When two quarrel
Savo Manojlović skilfully used the gap that was created. As NADA decided to boycott, he turned his Move-Change movement into a political party and applied for the elections. It was a pragmatic, politically smart move, which confirms that he won over 17 percent of the vote in the first place.
As a Serb from Kosovo with the blessing of Bishop Grigori, clearly patriotic, but status neutral in the campaign for local elections, for many Belgraders he was an attractive option.
The first cracks in the progressive tower
In addition, since the "Serbia against violence" protest, he has been followed by the image of someone who does not back down in front of progressive beaters - there is that video from the Gazelle when he is attacked, and he raises his guard and starts to fight back. It was especially impressive to younger Belgraders who are fed up with whining and hippie stories about love and non-violence.
He also showed an enviable level of managerial skills during the organization of mass protests against Rio Tinto when he managed to force Vučić to raise the white flag in the Jadra valley, at least temporarily.
A combination of Dr. Milić and Dr. Nestorović
"Savo achieved a very good result in Belgrade because he was a kind of combination of Doctor Nestorović from Belgrade on December 17 and Doctor Milić from Niš in the elections on June 2." As such, he managed to squeeze into the niche of the raging 'Serbia against violence' and the NADA coalition," says political analyst Đorđe Vukadinović for "Vreme".
He believes, however, that Savo is not a new leader of the opposition, and that bidding for the opposition leadership in general is "problematic and counterproductive", that certain parties and leaders of the opposition are "fishing for it, although such stories are the coward's egg that Vučić is laying on the opposition".
But he admits that Savo Manojlović launched himself as "a relevant factor that both the government and the opposition must count on."
Vukadinović claims that the "moral winners" are those who boycotted the elections, and the biggest losers are the fighting part of "Serbia against violence" that participated in the elections, especially the ZLF.
"It turned out that the people of Belgrade are fed up with the elections that they went to three times in two years," explains Vukadinović.
Soccer is played with goals
If, however, the leader of the opposition in Belgrade is determined on the basis of the achieved result and not on personal affinities, if the idea that someone who did not participate in the race can be considered the leader of the race is rejected, then Savo Manojlović qualified as the leader of the Belgrade opposition.
Whether that primacy will be recognized by "Biramo Beograd", which announced the continuation of "successful" cooperation with Kreni-Promeni, is another question. The boycotting part of the opposition certainly won't, on the contrary.
Political vanities, to the regret of citizens eager for political changes, broke the hard-made but very promising opposition coalition "Serbia against violence". The question is whether he will stand in the way of the new opposition alliance in Belgrade, in which the current star of the opposition is Savo Manojlović.
