In the days when the current breaks school year and is trying to determine whether students and pupils will return to the benches or completely give up one school year and continue their protest until the conditions are finally met, the students have made a new decision that has been waiting for some time - they demand the regime to call early elections for the Serbian Parliament.
After six months of blockades and fighting in the streets, fighting in villages and cities, fighting on the roads of Europe, the student movement turned to the option of trying to get out of the deep crisis in the country thanks to the ballot box and thus bring the necessary changes.
Here, finally, is the political articulation that was being avoided and that was not even talked about. Namely, this option was coldly rejected a long time ago because it was expected that "the state will work" and "the institutions will start acting according to the law". But, as this did not happen, and the regime did not relent in its repression, a climate was created in which it was necessary to demand the inevitable. And that is the announcement of elections in which a movement initiated or supported by students would try to defeat the party machine of Aleksandar Vučić.
HOW TO REACH AN AGREEMENT
Unlike others, this student decision of May 5 did not meet with the full approval of the public, which as a rule applauded and supported everything the students did and said. The atmosphere is such that, in a way, the students are being told: you remembered well, where were you to say that on March 15 in Belgrade, you didn't want to talk to Vučić, and now you are asking him to be in charge when he is on the ropes... All those voices and comments illustrate the kind of ambivalence that the part of society that does not support this regime has.
While on one side there is a monolith, which is unquestioningly supported by an entire army of voters with unlimited funds for a continuous campaign and which controls all the power in Serbia, on the other side there is a disorganized group that is difficult to get on one track. She still did not understand that her monolith should be a response to the will of one person and at the same time a clear alternative to the current regime.
"I don't see what is standing in the way of us not agreeing," cried Dejan Ilić, Belgrade publisher, Peščanika columnist, in Utisk of the Week, a man who was recently taken to the Belgrade police because of his publicly expressed views.
It seems that after half a year of independent action and isolation "from politics", at least two things came to mind for the student movement: first - the regime is not interested in changing anything in Serbia (except at the level of giving more money to universities, but getting submission in return); and secondly - that the student initiative itself, without the involvement of political actors, cannot bring about changes because they are the result of political and not some imaginary processes. In this sense, the demand for elections should mean that students now have an understanding of the opposition and other groups - activist or non-governmental - that are their allies in the fight for change in Serbia.
If that happened, then it is necessary to enter the next phase and make some kind of pre-election coalition or agreement about what is expected to be done in the future elections and what should be done after them if a majority in the parliament is won. The students have so far shown an unprecedented ability to organize, which goes so far as to tell myths and spread rumors about it from the beginning that "there is no way" that "they are planning this" but, I guess, there is some organization behind them that is planning their every step and move for the last six months. But now they are entering the field of real politics, much different and more dramatic than any they have been in so far and in which completely different rules of behavior and relations between actors rule.
The call for elections is a call for the regime, and it remains to be seen whether there will also be a call for everyone else to come to a social agreement on how to oppose the regime in future elections. They can be announced unexpectedly quickly, and they may not be there before some "regular appointment" if there is not extremely strong pressure on the street.
STUDENTI, PUBLIC AND PARTIES
Today, at the beginning of May, it does not seem that this pressure is particularly strong, despite the fact that this week students are also marching towards Loznica, where a new large protest is scheduled for Friday, May 9. In fact, it seems that the whole society, tired of the excitement of blockades and protests, has retreated to "reserve positions" and is looking for a way to "regain its breath". The regime is in the same state, which is obviously on the ropes, groggy and not to mention sick, so it is looking for a way to pull itself together and try to show strength.
Serbia is paralyzed. The student initiative has brought results, so that the majority can also wonder what life in Serbia looks like and what our future holds. Several magnificent mass gatherings gave new strength to the movement that is for change and that still believes in the idea of a state based on law, despite the toughness and unscrupulousness of the regime that was forced to overthrow the government of Miloš Vučević. Now that same parliamentary majority claims that it has the legitimacy to support some kind of government of Đura Macuta.
In this context, new extraordinary elections - and those that would be scheduled immediately - are the most obvious solution for trying to make a fairer distribution of political power, but those from the opposition who say that there will be no elections until the electoral conditions change are not wrong either.
"Let the students work with us to improve the election conditions," said Ivanka Popović, former rector of BU, now professor emeritus at the University of Belgrade and one of the founders of the Proglas initiative, on Tuesday.
In an article on Peščanik, lawyer Sofija Mandić says something similar to the students and somewhat ironically says that students are now turning to "an unexpected institution, giving it importance when it is weaker than ever".
Actor Nikola Kojo and former DS president Bojan Pajtić call on everyone to unreservedly support the students' initiative, especially political parties that reacted in different ways to the first hint of the idea that students would seek elections.
The opposition parties that immediately supported the student initiative are the DS, the Ecological Uprising, Kreni-Promeni, and the Green-Left Front. Earlier, the SSP and the Heart Movement were skeptical of a possible initiative, insisting that the concept of a transitional government should be maintained. The party of NPS leader Miki Aleksić abandoned that concept, who now says that it is too late for a transitional government and that they should turn to new initiatives.
What unites everyone on the opposition side of Serbia is still the same: general mistrust, rivalry and the inability to overcome either political or personal vanity. They look like quarreling local SNS committees without Vučić. That's why it seems that their election result would be just like that - around the threshold of three percent.
In the triangle regime-opposition-student movement, the latter currently have the greatest trust of the citizens, as all the surveys from December last year show, and it would be good if such a mood of the citizens could also be seen in the redistribution of political power, influence and responsibility.
The students must further decide whether they will lead the process or just support someone, and the opposition must unite and ask for that support from the students while offering everything they can to that future list and to a future Government of Serbia, which will actually be a transitional government. And those in the opposition who have different ideas should also explain to the public why there is no common front.
LEGITIMITY AND MOBILIZATION
On the other hand, SNS and Vučić - whose position as the president of the country is undisputed for now - have less and less legitimacy. This is clear to them, which is why one might expect Vučić to go to the elections after all, because he has repeatedly repeated that he will not hold power without legitimacy, but it is also hard to believe that he will go into a fight that he cannot win in advance. Maybe now is the moment to face off in a relatively fair game, which will never be fair considering the resources and media manipulation in his hands, but to offer Serbia a way out of the crisis in a civilized way in the months when he is no longer able to form a relevant government. In his decision to do that, he can be greatly helped by voices from outside, especially from the European Union and its individual members. The EU could also help with the implementation of the entire electoral process. Vučić has what no one had: the future against him, the youth that sacrifices itself to change Serbia and that this change increasingly means that he is not in power, moreover.
The fact that teachers are returning to schools and that people from the University do not want to question the existence of that institution does not mean that the regime has won - it seems that the idea of a new tactic, but with the same strategic goal, is maturing.
The student rebellion in the past months has shown how seemingly impossible things are possible when carried out by those who have credibility, and that is why it is now perhaps for the first time possible to imagine that students, even if they were to return to classes, could quickly organize themselves into rebellions again if the regime tries to carry out some kind of fraud in secret. If anything is the legacy of these months of rebellion, it may be two things: the understanding between teachers and students and the willingness of a part of society to react quickly to violations of the rights of a group.
What is still waiting is a well-organized movement that will operate on the territory of the entire Serbia, with an excellent connection with the diaspora and that will bring an electoral victory against this regime even in limited electoral conditions. That's why we are waiting for what else the students and those who see themselves as opposition to this regime will tell us.
