Vucevic Announces SNS Rally on Trg Slobode in Novi Sad
SNS leader Milos Vucevic announced a rally on Trg Slobode in Novi Sad in two weeks to welcome Aleksandar Vucic, though portal 021 points to early September. Novi Sad's opposition has responded.
Milos Vucevic, president of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), announced that the party will hold a rally on Trg Slobode in Novi Sad in two weeks, where he expects a welcome for President Aleksandar Vucic. Vucevic made the announcement on the evening of August 23, addressing a crowd in Donji Petrovci, a village in the Ruma municipality.
“The state is not a toy, and elections are not a game,” Vucevic said, adding that the outcome of the upcoming elections would affect the lives of all citizens and their families.
The SNS leader said the party had achieved good results in previous elections in Ruma and called on citizens to show responsibility. He spelled out clearly the message he wants the announced Novi Sad rally to carry, urging residents of Ruma and Srem to turn out in large numbers.
“To welcome the President of the Republic of Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic, to his and our Novi Sad. And to tell them that Serbia is united. And to tell them that Vojvodina is Serbia, has been and will remain,” Vucevic said.
He added that the goal of the list led by Vucic is victory for the sake of the future of children, grandchildren and all citizens of Serbia, with the message that only a united Serbia wins.
Sources disagree on the rally’s exact date
In Donji Petrovci, Vucevic spoke of a rally “in two weeks,” which would point to the first days of September. Portal 021, however, reports that the Novi Sad rally might not be scheduled until early September, with September 4 mentioned unofficially as a possible date. The gap between Vucevic’s announcement and the information reported by 021 has not been resolved, and at the time of these statements the elections had not yet been called.
We previously reported on SNS entering the campaign: the party is running with the United Serbia list. The Trg Slobode rally is the first time the party leadership has publicly named both a location and an approximate timeframe for launching its ground campaign in Novi Sad, a city the ruling party has repeatedly called key to the election outcome.
Novi Sad’s opposition responds
Representatives of opposition parties in Novi Sad reacted to the ruling party’s announcements of victory in the city. Janko Veselinovic, a member of the presidency of the Party of Freedom and Justice (SSP), had a brief response.
“You can’t win if you’re killing,” Veselinovic said, reacting to the ruling party’s announcements about the rally and its expected victory in Novi Sad.
Bojan Kostres of the League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina (LSV) argues that the Serbian Progressive Party stands no chance in Novi Sad without fraud, or as he put it, “violent seizure.” Miran Pogacar of the Civic Movement Bravo demanded that the authorities publish the opinion polls they cite when announcing victory in the city, rather than predicting the result without evidence.
Criticism of university blockades
In the same address in Donji Petrovci, Vucevic criticized the university blockades, arguing that they had damaged universities in Serbia and that divisions within society are among the biggest consequences of events from the recent period.
“That means every student record book is worth less today. That means every professor, associate professor and teaching assistant at universities in Serbia is worth less. That means the diploma of every academic citizen of Serbia who graduates tomorrow is worth less on the labor market,” Vucevic said.
He also argued that divisions had been created in society between generations, between residents of cities and villages, and between people of different education levels and incomes, and that the political response to those divisions should come at the elections.
An open question ahead of the campaign
No official party statement with the exact date of the rally has been issued so far, leaving it open whether Novi Sad will welcome Vucic in two weeks, as Vucevic announced, or only in early September, around the date unofficially mentioned by 021. That question will only be answered once the elections are officially called, and until then the opposition in the city continues to dispute both the announcements and the polls on which the ruling party bases its claim to victory.
