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🇷🇸 Serbia /Elections & Politics

Election conditions are far worse than in 2023, Serbian election commissioner says

From N1 Serbia · () Serbian

Translated from Serbian and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

Interview Named sources New plan
  • Serbian election commissioner Sofija Mandić said conditions across the electoral process have deteriorated significantly since 2023.
  • She cited media conditions, the nonfunctional electronic media regulator, election laws allowing so-called phantom lists and what she called an officials’ campaign.
  • Mandić warned that future election days could see violence and questioned whether a planned visit by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen might benefit the ruling Serbian Progressive Party.

Sofija Mandić, a lawyer and member of Serbia’s Republican Electoral Commission, says the country’s election conditions are now significantly worse than they were in 2023. She argues that many problems identified during the last parliamentary elections and recent local elections remain unresolved.

Speaking on Nova S television, Mandić pointed to the state of the media, the functioning of the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Media, election laws that allow “phantom lists” without duplicated or falsified signatures, and what she called the current campaign by public officials.

She cited a CRTA study indicating that President Aleksandar Vučić had appeared live on television an average of four times a day recently. Mandić said his dominance was evident, while the media regulator no longer functioned properly. She also referred to decisions by the Administrative Court and said the Constitutional Court continued to keep a case concerning earlier electoral irregularities pending.

The only thing that is better is people’s awareness that things must change.

· Sofija MandićMandić identified public awareness as the one improvement in Serbia’s electoral environment.

Mandić said the only improvement was greater public awareness that changes were necessary. She expressed hope that public dissatisfaction could ultimately outweigh what she described as extensive electoral engineering by the authorities.

She expects the amended election laws to produce dozens of phantom lists, which she said could create “artificial majorities” on polling boards. She also warned that recent local elections indicated the possibility of violence on a future election day.

Commenting on the planned visit by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen before the elections, Mandić recalled that von der Leyen had visited Vučić before the previous elections and promised to return a month later to assess progress on election conditions. That follow-up visit did not take place. Mandić said she hoped the next visit would not become a gift to the Serbian Progressive Party’s campaign. She also noted that snap elections would have to be called by Wednesday, September 9, at the latest to take place on October 25, as Vučić had previously announced.

I hope the future visit will not be a gift to the Serbian Progressive Party’s election campaign.

· Sofija MandićShe questioned whether Ursula von der Leyen’s planned visit could benefit the ruling party.
About this summary

Originally published by N1 Serbia in Serbian. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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