Dacic Leads SPS List Filed With RIK

The coalition built around the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) has filed its election list with the Republic Election Commission (RIK), backed by 21,266 signatures from citizens. It is the second list submitted to RIK for the snap parliamentary election set for October 25, after the list filed by the Serbian Progressive Party on Saturday.

The list runs under the name “Ivica Dacic, a Factor of Stability! Coalition SPS-JS-SDPS-Greens of Serbia.” The coalition brings together the Socialist Party of Serbia, United Serbia, the Social Democratic Party of Serbia and the Greens of Serbia. Topping the list is Ivica Dacic, SPS president and, until now, first deputy prime minister and interior minister. With this, Dacic, one of the longest-serving figures in Serbian politics, has formally become the lead candidate of his own party’s independent list, in an election where SPS is not running in the same coalition as SNS for the first time in years.

When was the list actually filed

Sources disagree on the exact day of filing. Telegraf published the news on Wednesday, September 12, at 10:28 p.m., reporting that the list had been filed that same day. Nova.rs, citing RTS, published the same news the same day at 11:26 p.m. Sputnik Serbia, also citing RTS, dates the filing to September 13. None of the sources reviewed give an exact time, and none of the participants in the filing are quoted in the available reports.

News of the filing first appeared on the Instagram account “Socijalisti Beograda” (Belgrade Socialists), before it was picked up by the media. Only afterward did Telegraf, Tanjug, N1 and Nova.rs report on the filing, all citing the same source: the party’s own post.

According to the outlet Ozon Media, signatures for the SPS list were also collected outside Belgrade, in Sremska Mitrovica, where about 400 citizens gave their support. The same outlet reports that signatures for the first list filed, the SNS list, were likewise collected in both Sremska Mitrovica and nearby Lacarak, showing that neither of the two largest lists filed so far relied on Belgrade alone, with both also gathering signatures inland.

The second list, after SNS

The coalition list around SPS is the second RIK has received for the upcoming election. The first, filed on Saturday at around 1 p.m., was the “Aleksandar Vucic, United Serbia” list, with 250 candidates for parliament and 224,557 signatures of support, ten times more than the SPS-led coalition gathered. That list is led by Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, who would also become the candidate for prime minister should the list win.

SPS is running separately from SNS in this election, despite the two parties having shared power in the same coalition for years. Instead of the Socialists, the “Aleksandar Vucic, United Serbia” list includes the Serbian Radical Party, the Party of United Pensioners, Farmers and Proletarians of Serbia (PUPS) and Zeljko Veselinovic’s Workers’ Party. Partners that shared the previous government are thus split across two separate lists in this election, rather than running together as they did before.

The remaining names and the order of candidates on the SPS list have not yet been published, and none of the participants have commented on the filing itself. Srpske vesti previously reported on the filing of the first list, the SNS list, with its 224,557 signatures.

What comes next

Signature collection for the remaining election lists is still underway, including for the student list, which is gathering signatures in several towns in Srem as well. Ahead of the snap parliamentary election set for October 25, RIK still has to receive and certify the remaining lists, including those from opposition parties and coalitions that have announced their candidacies but have not yet turned them into an official signature filing.