One scene with pre-election trips of Aleksandar Vučić this summer it reflects his target voters quite well.
"My grandfather taught me the following - don't tell a woman everything, don't help the poor and agree with the authorities, whatever they are," said a man from Prijepolje, standing next to the supreme progressive.
He is one of those who came out to ask the President of Serbia a question, while he "walks among the people" during July and August in an intensive election campaign and promises to fulfill what they ask of him, whether it is about asphalt, sewage or employment.
Vučić brags about being kissed by grandmothers all over the country, who left the house for the first time in a long time - just to see him.
Timely voting army
Analyst Đorđe Vukadinović says for "Vreme" that research into the New Serbian Political Thought, which was exclusively published by "Vreme"., consistently show that people over the age of 65 support the government to a significant extent.
"In all age groups, there are those who support the regime, but the older population, over 65, does so to a significant extent," Vukadinović told "Vreme". "They are Vučić's main reservoir of power, his voting army."
However, you should always keep in mind that among them there are citizens who think absolutely differently.
"It is important to understand that when we announce something like that, we are always contacted by a large number of citizens from this group who wholeheartedly, energetically and passionately stand up against the regime and they do not want to be talked about in that way. We do not want to portray them that way either, but that is a matter of statistics," adds the analyst.
You should remember that. large protest of pensioners on Republic Square in Belgrade, where about 10.000 people said exactly that - the fact that we are older does not mean that we are not aware of what the regime is doing. Then they sent an important message to the students – that even among their group there are people who absolutely support them.
The government controls the traditional channels
Statistics and analyzes of the NSPM show that two-thirds of people who are over 70 years old support the regime, while in the category over 60 years old, that support is more than half.
Oliver Tošković, a professor at the Faculty of Philosophy, explains to "Vreme" that there is a basic psychological explanation that conservatism grows with age - we become more closed and less ready for change. Simply put, we maintain the status quo.
"Older people are turned to traditional media and television, and the government has complete control over national frequencies," Tošković told Vreme. "Thus, it is much more difficult for those citizens to get different information that is not exclusively sent by the regime."
Photo: Tanjug/Dejan IvaniševićSNS has been in the pre-election campaign for a long time
Young people are fighting back with change.
What hinders Vučić's calculations are the young people who have woken up, and who he cannot attract to his side. The President of Serbia, however, boasted in front of Pink television cameras that in the last year the number of young people who support SNS has increased drastically, from 18 to 31 percent.
Vukadinović thinks that there is no question of 31 percent.
"Vučić's estimates are too high, but his statement only shows that he acknowledges what we published and were attacked for that, which is that the support of SNS among young people is very low," adds the analyst. "Even if we take Vučić's numbers as the initial premise, it would mean that young people, i.e. those aged 18 to 40, versus the elderly, i.e. people over 65, are now in the voting mirror. One is for Vučić, the other is for students."
That mirror, he adds, was made by students. Because the student protests brought about a huge change that worries the government, which is an enormous increase in the interest of younger people in the elections.
Tošković says that throughout political history, young people tend to change things they are not satisfied with. It was like that during the rule of Slobodan Milošević, and it is like that now.
"Young people see that something is wrong, they are more and more educated and see the possibility of change, and they are also turned to new sources of information, the Internet, so it is harder for the government to reach them, you cannot deceive them," says the professor of psychology.
That is why he says that it is important for Vučić to send "false" messages about the support of 31 percent of young people, even though all research says the complete opposite.
"Hence the episode with the influencer Buck Praset, because the president is trying to find influential figures among young people, such as Prase, in order to win over some of the voters who are not for him," adds Tošković. "This is how Students who want to learn and Miloš Pavlović were born. However, it turned out that it is very difficult for the regime to find more than one or two such exemplary students."
Photo: FoNet/APStudent revolt against injustice
Senior chess game
For Vukadinović, the problem is that older people, especially those over 70, go out en masse and vote in elections, while young people under 30 years old have not done so in the past.
"The most important question is whether the turnout of people between the ages of 18 and 30 will be in the same range as those older than 60 and 70. I believe that this is where the key to changing the government lies," says Vukadinović.
For Tošković, the decisive regime battle will be fought precisely for the youth. It will be, he says, a fight for every voice and by all means.
"The regime will shoot at all layers of young people, wherever they can get in. I'm sure they will also try blackmail, pressure and, of course, violence. I believe that the violence will only get worse because there is already a fire under their feet," he adds. "They will harness all resources, media, paramilitary formations and criminals because it is a machine that does not spare anything. That is why this fight should be understood as a two-year chess game."
Photo: Presidency of SerbiaWho won this game: Vučić and a pensioner from Surdulica in a game of chess in 2024
Crucified between the cult of youth and the cult of old age
For Vukadinović, people who are at the peak of intellectual and physical strength will also be important to Vukadinović - those aged 40 to 60, who he says have suffered a lot in the previous years and decades, and were neglected during the analyses.
"By all parameters, They they should be a pillar of society, and our research shows that they have been the most stable support of the anti-regime base for years," says Vukadinović. "Those voters are the link between two mirrors. They constantly worry about what 'our grandparents' think, but also how 'our children' will live and where their future is. They are torn between the cult of old age and the cult of youth."
Since Serbia does not have the "cult of stability and predictability" that characterizes strong democracies, Vukadinović says that it is no accident that the government has marginalized them.
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