Serbia's Post-Election Arrests Raise Hopes and Doubts Over Justice Reform

Air Serbia flight JU134, bound from Belgrade to Moscow on November 3, was already deep in Lithuanian airspace when the crew was told to turn around and go back to the Serbian capital. Aboard were three senior figures from the era of former President Aleksandar Vucic: Aleksandar Vulin, a former defense and interior minister and ex-head of the Security Intelligence Agency (BIA); Dusan Bajatovic, the long-serving director of the state gas company Srbijagas; and Nenad Popovic, a minister without portfolio.

All three are known in Serbia for close ties to Moscow and for controversies that include allegations of corruption and abuse of public office. Unofficial reports in several outlets said the plane was recalled over a security breach: Vulin had allegedly boarded without the mandatory security screening. Since 2023 he has been under US sanctions, which Washington justified by citing corrupt and destabilizing activities that undermine the rule of law in the Western Balkans. Vulin said he was going to Moscow to discuss extending a gas agreement with Russia. Bajatovic said he did not know why Vulin and Popovic were travelling and denied that the two would attend the scheduled gas-supply meetings.

The episode might have stayed a curiosity had it not come nine days after the Students' List won a landslide over the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) in the October 25 parliamentary election, ending 14 years of dominance by Vucic and the SNS. The new majority has not yet taken control of any levers of power. Even so, the days since have brought arrests, new criminal proceedings and the reopening of unresolved cases at remarkable speed, some of them striking at the foundations of the system built under the SNS.

Prosecutors have opened investigations into suspected electoral manipulation, corruption and abuse of office. Four people were arrested in Novi Sad on suspicion of vote-buying. Six were detained in Mali Zvornik on suspicion of helping citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina register residence in Serbia so they could vote. The most prominent case is that of Davor Macura, owner of Alta Bank, suspected of illegally entering the bank's vault and removing the equivalent of about €383 million ($430 million). He was arrested days after the National Bank of Serbia revoked the bank's license and started bankruptcy proceedings. Macura has been publicly linked to the SNS, and the bank did significant business with the state and had many Russian clients. Senior police officials, the head of the Republic Hydrometeorological Institute and several public-company managers have also been arrested over suspected abuse of office and rigged procurement.

The pace worries some insiders. Prosecutor Bojana Savovic told DW the sudden activity paints a sad picture of the prosecution service, and she reads it as an effort to curry favor with the incoming authorities. In her words, prosecutors are showing what they could have done but would not until ten days ago. She hopes speed will not cost the quality of indictments, and that the cases are not personal vendettas inside the old regime.

Students and representatives of the new majority are pressing for investigations into corruption cases left unresolved for years, saying no one should be above the law and that prosecutors and courts must act or answer for not acting. Tanja Arsic, an incoming MP from the Students' List, said the rules allow action when there is will, but that people obstructed the system by putting cases in drawers.

After the election, reports and video footage suggested official documents might have been removed or destroyed in state institutions and public companies. On October 29, Prosecutor General Zagorka Dolovac issued a binding instruction to all chief public prosecutors to prevent the destruction of official and other records. The Students' List urged employees of state institutions and the media to report any destruction. Savovic notes that even attempting to destroy official records is punishable.

Whether investigators will reach the top is unanswered. Vucic has said he is not afraid of arrest and that nothing will be found against him on money, since he signs nothing and does nothing in that area. But accountability also turns on who made decisions, who gave orders and who held real power over the deals now under scrutiny. Arsic warned it would be tragic if the biggest figures, whose arrests are expected, were prosecuted on thin evidence or charged with something far lighter than what they did. Rushing to indictments that end in acquittals would be even worse, she said.

Savovic argues success will be measured not by popular arrests but by final convictions and permanent confiscation of criminally acquired assets. She doubts the existing structures can deliver, saying people promoted for obedience and self-censorship have filled the prosecution service and courts for decades, and that without fundamental change in the judiciary, police and security services she sees no lasting transformation. The verdicts will show whether Serbia is breaking with its old system or swapping one set of power brokers for another.