Tens of thousands demonstrated again in Serbia on Saturday against the violence in the country. The demonstrators demanded the resignation of President Vucic.
After two rampages in early May, tens of thousands of people demonstrated again in Belgrade against the violence in Serbia on Saturday evening. The participants in the rally gathered in front of the Parliament in the center of the Serbian capital and then formed a human chain around the nearby headquarters of state television RTS. They demanded the resignation of the authoritarian President Aleksandar Vucic.
It was the fourth protest in a row after a 13-year-old student shot nine classmates and a security guard in a Belgrade school in early May. A day later, a 21-year-old shot people in a village near Belgrade, killing eight of them. The two massacres, which were not directly related, deeply shook Serbian society.
Violence and mafia crime
The rally on Saturday was peaceful. It was directed against Vucic and his government, as well as against private television stations that whitewashed violence and mafia crime and made propaganda for those in power. Vucic himself repeatedly speaks of hatred and contempt for political opponents.
The state broadcaster RTS is also the focus of opposition criticism because it hardly allows non-government voices to have their say and Vucic serves as a mouthpiece. Liberal and left-wing opposition parties and civil movements had called for the protest.
Serbian President Vucic resigns from party leadership
Vucic, in turn, resigned from his post as leader of the ruling party on Saturday. A “different approach is needed to bring together a larger number of forces of those who want to fight for the victory of a patriotic, successful Serbia,” Vucic said at a party congress of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS). The 53-year-old remains President of the Balkan country.
The SNS won last year’s parliamentary elections in a landslide victory. However, the party has repeatedly been accused of corruption. Vucic is a co-founder of the SNS and has been party leader since 2012.
“Whatever you do, I will always be with you and by your side,” the president assured party members. Defense Minister Milos Vucevic was elected the new party leader.
Vucic had already announced that he would start a nationwide movement that would include prominent intellectuals, artists and other public figures. Such a movement is expected to gradually merge with the SNS. According to analysts, Vucic is significantly more popular than his party. A fresh coalition would help give the SNS, which has been plagued by corruption scandals, a new image.
