Serbia's Student List secures majority in parliamentary election

The Defeat of Aleksandar Vučić and the Rise of the Student List

Serbia’s Student List movement secured a decisive victory in the October 25 parliamentary elections, capturing 53% of the popular vote and defeating former president Aleksandar Vučić and his Serbian Progressive Party. According to reporting by rte.ie, the anti-corruption coalition translated its mandate into 140 seats out of 250 in the Serbian national assembly, comfortably surpassing the 125 seats required for a clear majority. The ousted SNS party finished with roughly 39% of the vote and 104 seats in opposition. The snap elections saw a preliminary voter turnout of 68.78%, marking the highest participation rate in the country over the past decade.

The Student List movement, born in Serbian universities and driven by the mobilisation of thousands of young people, has just defeated the coalition led by Aleksandar Vučić in the parliamentary elections. This is a historic moment for Serbia, but also for Europe, and a sign that…

— https://x.com/RuiPinto_FL/status/2114465372673892576

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The historic political shift traces its roots back to November 2024, when a concrete canopy collapsed at a renovated railway station in Novi Sad, killing 16 people including two children. Public outrage erupted over allegations that endemic corruption and a lack of transparency in awarding public contracts caused the structural failures. Per details shared by former UN diplomat Garrett Patrick Kelly with Newstalk, the tragedy served as the breaking point for a population that had previously witnessed two separate grassroots movements dissolve over waterfront development and lithium mining. Unlike its predecessors, the student coalition sustained peaceful street protests for two years until forcing the snap election.

Electoral Obstacles and Allegations of Manipulation

The path to the ballot box was fraught with procedural hurdles and intense friction. According to election monitoring organization CRTA cited by The Conversation, the incumbent administration relied on familiar electoral strategies to tilt the playing field, including vote buying, fraudulent registrations of non-resident or deceased voters, and ballot box stuffing. Authorities also faced criticism over a sharp spike in voter registrations abroad, which topped 120,000—more than double the figures recorded in the 2023 elections.

Serbia's Student List secures majority in parliamentary election — Photo: Meduza

The climate of intimidation extended directly to university campuses. During pre-election demonstrations, Serbian film student Mia recounted to Newstalk her violent arrest outside the Faculty of Law in Belgrade, stating that police officers pulled her hair to unlock her phone and retrieve footage of the crackdown. Despite such pressures, the student movement maintained a disciplined, leaderless structure built on collective debate and assemblies rather than a single prominent figurehead.

Immediate Policy Priorities for the Incoming Technocratic Government

With official results pending from Serbia’s Electoral Commission, newly elected MPs face a constitutional window of 30 days—extendable to 90 days—to officially form a government. Ivan Vejvoda, a Serbian political scientist and co-founder of the Europe’s Futures Initiative, told rte.ie that the administration’s primary mandate is “putting the house in order” by reforming security services and dismantling what he termed “a captured state where democracy had backslid.”

How students rocked Serbia’s parliamentary election | Explainer

The Student List campaigned under the uncompromising slogan “Serbia or the mafia,” pledging to establish independent police bodies to investigate corruption outside the direct purview of the interior ministry.

Public media reform is expected to move even faster than structural judiciary overhauls. The day following the vote, a news anchor from regional broadcaster RNS issued a live on-air apology, admitting the station had provided one-sided information and failed to ask critical questions.

The Candidate Shortlist and Foreign Policy Stances

Because the Student List campaigned without a designated leader, the movement must now select a prime minister and cabinet ministers from its ranks. Nearly half of the 250 candidates who stood for election came from academic backgrounds, including doctors, lawyers, engineers, journalists, and agricultural experts. Three primary figures have emerged as frontrunners for the premiership:

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Ilija Srdanović: A cardiologist and university professor from Novi Sad who has affirmed the movement’s commitment to European integration and aligning domestic policy with EU rule-of-law standards.
Dejan Šoškić: A former governor of the National Bank of Serbia who resigned in 2012 over legislation reducing the central bank’s independence.
Dejan Bodiroga: A former professional basketball player and one of the movement’s most recognizable public figures.

Foreign policy questions loom large over the incoming administration. While figures like Srdanović maintain a commitment to European accession talks—which stalled in 2014 over rule-of-law benchmarks and Kosovo relations—the Student List opposes Kosovan independence and views the territory as an integral part of Serbia. Meanwhile, ousted leader Aleksandar Vučić asserted in an interview with Ksenia Sobchak covered by Meduza that the incoming government would impose sanctions against Russia within 10 days of taking office—a claim explicitly rejected by Student List representatives during pre-election debates, where they affirmed Serbia’s stance against restrictive measures on Moscow.

As the new technocratic government prepares to take office, political analysts note that dismantling entrenched institutional loyalty will pose a significant test, echoing the prolonged bureaucratic hurdles seen during recent democratic transitions in Poland and Hungary.