Vučić concedes defeat as Serbia's student movement wins in record-turnout election

On Sunday night, at his party headquarters in Belgrade, Serbia's longtime leader Aleksandar Vučić told supporters that he had lost. Final results were not yet in, he said, but a sample made it clear: the Student List had won, with between 135 and 140 seats in the 250-seat parliament, and his side would have 105.

The pollsters' figures were close to his own. A representative sample from CeSID-IPSPS put the Student List at 138 deputies and Vučić's rightwing Serbian Progressive party, the SNS, at 104. The remaining seats were likely to go to parties representing ethnic national minorities. If the numbers hold, they end 12 years of Vučić's dominance and hand a parliamentary majority to a movement that began in the streets.

The day had already been historic. Long lines snaked out of polling stations across the country, and some voters reported waits of up to two hours. By 7pm local time, the monitors and pollsters CeSID and Ipsos put turnout at 67.6%, the highest since the breakup of Yugoslavia in 1992. The students' final pre-election rally in Belgrade the week before had drawn an estimated 150,000 people, and together the two signs fed early speculation that they had built enough support to open a new political era.

The story goes back to November 2024, when a concrete canopy collapsed at the Novi Sad railway station and killed 16 people. Students began protesting, and the movement grew into a broad campaign against the government as evidence pointed to slipshod construction, fraud and corruption behind the collapse. Over two years the pressure on Vučić mounted. Last month he resigned the presidency and gambled on snap elections.

The students turned the moment into a campaign. They put forward 250 candidates for the 250 seats, among them academics, athletes and farmers, and asked voters to back a plan to rebuild the economy and restore democracy. They faced a ruling party that had taken over almost all of the broadcast channels and used ministries and state institutions as political tools. Vučić accused the students of being stooges of foreign powers, which they denied. He promised higher pensions and public sector salaries and presented himself as the leader able to balance Serbia's ties with the west against those with Russia and China. The students answered with rallies, visits to rural areas that had long been Vučić strongholds, and door-to-door canvassing under the slogan "Serbia or Mafia?"

Dejan Bodiroga, a Student List candidate and president of Euroleague Basketball, voted in Belgrade on Sunday and echoed that framing. "Today, above all, Serbia is fighting for freedom and for the return of a country that has been hijacked," he told reporters.

The vote was not clean, according to independent observers. Before election day, international and local monitors had raised concerns about detentions and reports of surveillance and cyber-attacks against activists. On Sunday, independent groups recorded the photographing of ballots, which suggested pressure on voters, as well as attempted vote-buying and carousel voting. Raša Nedeljkov of the monitoring group CRTA said a large number of irregularities continued to be recorded and that violent incidents outside polling stations were becoming increasingly frequent.

Still, as word of the concession spread, people celebrated in Belgrade and other cities. Ivana, 43, said it felt like three New Year's Eves at once and that Serbians could finally breathe again; she hoped for swift accountability for top members of the ousted government, a key pledge of the Student List. Some people shook hands with and hugged police officers, and car horns sounded through the streets. At the Student List headquarters, supporters chanted "Victory, victory!" Radomir Saičić, a Belgrade University professor speaking for the students, said: "Tonight we celebrate victory, tomorrow we build the future."

Online, there had been speculation that Vučić might try to cling to power regardless. His quick concession recalled that of his ally Viktor Orbán in Hungary six months earlier. What to watch now are the final results, the response to the monitors' reports of irregularities, and whether the new government delivers the accountability its voters were promised.