BELGRADE: Serbia’s student-backed movement won a projected 140 parliamentary seats in Sunday’s election, turning nearly two years of anti-corruption protests into a majority in the National Assembly.
Preliminary figures from the Republic Electoral Commission gave the Student List 52.71% of votes counted. Aleksandar Vučić’s Serbian Progressive Party-led alliance secured 39.17%, equivalent to 104 seats in the 250-member parliament.
Vučić conceded defeat on Sunday, ending his party’s long dominance of Serbian politics. Unlike traditional political parties, the winning movement relied on student assemblies to choose candidates and organise its campaign.
Known as plenums, these assemblies let students propose ideas, debate demands, and approve decisions by majority vote.
They selected academics, engineers, doctors, artists and activists to contest the parliamentary election. The movement emerged after a railway station canopy collapsed in Novi Sad in November 2024, killing 16 people.
Protesters blamed corruption for the disaster and demanded accountability. Vučić and his party have denied allegations of corruption and repression.
Students subsequently occupied university buildings and organised demonstrations across Serbia. Their assemblies coordinated protests without appointing a single public leader.
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Political scientist Branislav Radeljić said the system helped students turn public mobilisation into political action. University of Belgrade professor Nebojša Vladisavljević described the assemblies as part of a longstanding tradition of student organising across the Balkans.
Activists expanded their outreach through public rallies, cycling campaigns and local citizens’ assemblies known as zborovi.
They later shifted towards electoral politics after prolonged demonstrations failed to secure their demands. The movement adopted an 11-point programme covering anti-corruption measures, affordable housing and improved rural healthcare.
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Its broad membership includes competing political views, which could complicate decisions on government policy.
The student assemblies must now help determine who will serve as prime minister and how the new administration will organise its ministries.
