Nis: Police Cordon Blocks Students Near Crveni Pevac

A police cordon this morning stopped a column of students and citizens in Nis from reaching the National Theatre, where the Main Board of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) was meeting with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic in attendance. The gathering at the Crveni Pevac intersection began at 10:30 a.m., called by students under blockade at the University of Nis, and police closed the intersection to traffic and rerouted vehicles onto surrounding streets.

The SNS Main Board session was scheduled for 11 a.m., half an hour after the student rally began, at the very same National Theatre in Nis. It repeated a pattern already seen during Vucic’s earlier visits to cities where student blockades are underway: a party gathering held indoors while a protest forms outside.

The day before the rally, as we reported earlier, two people were called in to the police department for informative interviews over the planned gathering. It was already known at that point that the Serbian president would arrive in Nis on Saturday, and that students had announced they would greet him at Crveni Pevac.

According to the announcements that preceded the rally, the visit to Nis was also tied to new investment in southern Serbia, including the construction of a maternity hospital. Ahead of Vucic’s arrival, the opposition People’s Movement of Serbia raised the question of what had happened to the stadium, the maternity hospital and the high-speed rail line, projects that have been announced for Nis for some time. The ruling party and the opposition thus entered the day with opposing claims about the pace of investment in the city, as the student protest unfolded alongside it.

What happened on the ground

The police cordon kept citizens and students from passing down Vozdova Street to the National Theatre. Some tried to push through the rows of officers, while the crowd chanted “resign, resign” and “thieves, thieves,” accompanied by whistles and vuvuzelas. The chant “Aco Siptare” (a Vucic nickname paired with an ethnic slur for Albanians) was also heard.

Students under blockade at the University of Nis had called for the gathering with the slogan “City of the edict, not a city of dictate,” posted in their call to action on social media. At the same time, they urged participants to avoid clashes and published the number of the Academic Crisis Center, 063 1045 833, for reporting unrest, confrontations or arrests during the gathering.

In front of the National Theatre, according to reports from the scene, a sizeable number of SNS members and supporters had also gathered to show support for Vucic. The two groups were kept apart by the cordon along Vozdova Street, one in front of the theatre, the other at the Crveni Pevac intersection.

No incidents, in a tense atmosphere

The gathering passed off without incident, according to reports from the scene, even though the atmosphere was described as tense. No physical clashes or arrests occurred during the morning, and traffic in that part of the city remained suspended for as long as the gathering lasted. The students’ calls to avoid escalation, backed by an open line to the Academic Crisis Center, remained the main mechanism keeping the situation under control, given that the police cordon was the only physical barrier separating the two crowds.

Nis thus became, on Saturday morning, another city where an SNS party gathering coincided with a protest by students under blockade, a pattern that has repeated in several Serbian cities in recent weeks. A Main Board session held indoors, a cordon at the approaches and chanting from both sides of that cordon have become an almost routine picture ahead of such party events.

Whether Main Board sessions will keep being accompanied by cordons like this one, or organizers will change their approach to party gatherings in cities with an active student blockade, remains an open question ahead of the next dates on which the Serbian president’s arrival is announced.