Ponos and Jovanovic defend election run despite threshold

The lead candidates of the two opposition lists that are not on the Student List, Zdravko Ponos of the European Serbia coalition and Milos Jovanovic of Authentic Right, said last night, October 11, on the show Utisak nedelje that they are staying in the race for the October 25 election. In the same studio, political consultant Dusan Milenkovic repeated that, according to research done by his firm, neither of the two coalitions can clear the threshold.

Olja Beckovic hosted the show. Ponos is one of the leaders of the European Serbia list, which includes the Freedom and Justice Party, Serbia Centre and the Solidarity movement. Jovanovic heads Authentic Right, made up of the New Democratic Party of Serbia and the Monarchists. The Student List did not send a representative.

What does Milenkovic say about the threshold?

Milenkovic said his firm’s research this year showed that larger coalitions did clear the threshold, but that every split pushed the result far below it. The last measurement of the two coalitions now running, he said, was taken before the election was called.

“That did not happen, we have no columns, we have two coalitions and, according to all the research, especially ours from this year, they cannot clear the threshold. They are far from the threshold before the election was called, which is when we did our last survey. Many other surveys that have reached me confirm this and say the situation is even worse now, after the start of a referendum atmosphere, after the election was called,” Milenkovic said.

He called the withdrawal of the People’s Serbia coalition the turning point, and said it was influenced by the decisions of the Green-Left Front and the Movement of Free Citizens not to run. In his words, the anti-government electorate is sensitive to splits and has punished the opposition for them in the past. Milenkovic believes the Student List is winning, and reduces the question of how to vote to one thing.

“I think a vote for Vucic is a vote for this government staying, and a vote for the Student List is a vote for changing this government,” Milenkovic said.

Why does Ponos say a vote for European Serbia is not wasted?

Ponos said he has no doubt he is doing the right thing and that the decision to run is not based on a certain outcome. To the argument about “wasted votes,” he replied that nothing is wasted only if the lists bring to the polls voters who would otherwise stay home. By his calculation, dropping out would keep at least a third of their voters at home, which he estimates at no fewer than three lost seats for the opposition in the broadest sense.

“We are going to the election, and those who attacked us and Authentic Right know there is nothing to it. Now they have turned to discouraging our voters by saying it will be a wasted vote. If the situation is that we are one vote short of what is needed to enter Parliament and clear the threshold, then those 7 seats will be split, 3 and 4 between the Student List and the SNS, or the other way round. At least three are lost again. The only variant in which European Serbia enters Parliament, all eight seats are certainly on our side, the side where the Student List is too. Only in that variant, the Student List, which can even win and have the largest number of seats but has nobody to form a coalition with, is the loser of the election,” Ponos said.

The figures on seats in the two reports do not fully match. Vreme writes about “her seven seats” that would be split between the Student List and the SNS if the list missed by one vote, while N1 quotes Ponos’s calculation word for word, with eight seats tied to the side where the Student List stands. This article therefore carries his quote rather than a total. Vreme and N1 also do not attribute to the same speaker the phrasing that “European Serbia with eight seats or Authentic Right with eight seats” would be the winners of the election: N1 puts it with Ponos, Vreme with Milenkovic.

Ponos also spoke about the third of voters as people the Student List, in his view, does not reach.

“Those are the people for whom Serbia’s European path matters a lot, and they do not see it represented enough so far by the people who speak in the name of the Student List,” Ponos said.

Asked whether their numbers show there is no chance of falling below the threshold, Ponos replied that the latest numbers show exactly that. He also said the list was in its worst shape when the Movement of Free Citizens left the agreement and Miroslav Aleksic withdrew.

“That was probably the lowest point, and from the moment we submitted the list we stabilized, and we have been growing since, thanks to debates and public discussions,” Ponos said.

According to Vreme, Ponos also said on the show that there is a possibility of supporting a minority government of the Student List, but not unconditionally.

Jovanovic: the decision was made a year and a half ago

Jovanovic said the decision to run was made a year and a half ago, and that it was not mathematical but practical, political and principled. He said his list will clear the threshold, and that his goal is, as he put it, at least 250,000 votes.

“I am not saying we will take all 500,000, but they have nowhere else to go, most will come to us. Because if they do not come, hardly anyone will go to European Serbia. We do not make polls (…) a minimum of 250,000 is our goal, mine is a bit higher,” Jovanovic said.

He tied the 500,000 figure to the 2023 election, in which, he claims, that many voters cast ballots against Aleksandar Vucic for “patriotic options,” and of the three lists that received them, only his remains in the race. Asked about expectations, he recalled that in 2022 the list won 5.4 percent while polls gave it two percent.

Jovanovic also spoke about why a joint list never happened.

“When the students said on May 5 last year that they wanted elections without any change of conditions, when we understood that they do not want to go to the election with anyone else and want to run on their own, we took note. We publicly called several times for all opposition actors to be united on one list, and it was said on multiple occasions from their side that they do not want that,” Jovanovic said.

He described the difference with the government as one of program, not only of procedure.

“What bothers us is not only the absence of democracy, their thievery, arrogance, thugs and vulgarity. What bothers us is also the betrayal of national interests, which bothers some others much less. We are for a change of government, but also for a change of policy,” Jovanovic said.

He added that his list cooperates with the Student List in many places on election monitoring and that nobody on that list is his opponent. He sent this message to those who expect one of them to end up below the threshold:

“Let us get the maximum out of people who hold different views. Do not rejoice that one of us will not clear the threshold, we will certainly clear it. If that did happen, and I think it is even hypothetically impossible for us, there would be no change, that is what this is about,” Jovanovic said.

The Student List did not come

The Student List had no representative on the show. In a statement sent to the show, it said most of its candidates are taking part in the field campaign.

“Unfortunately, we will not be able to take part this week, because most of the candidates are involved in an active field campaign. We are preparing a big rally in Nis, rallies in Leskovac, Valjevo, Pozega, Pozarevac, Vrnjacka Banja. Together we are organizing stands, ‘Door to Door’ actions and other activities. We hope for an invitation to the next episode,” the Student List said in a statement.

Beckovic said the invitation will be extended to them again.

What do the public polls show?

The threshold is three percent. Vreme cites two public polls: according to a survey by the agency Faktor plus, the SNS has 48.6 percent, the Student List 37.1, the SPS 4.9 and European Serbia 3.6 percent, above the threshold. In a Crta and Stanford survey from June, the Student List has 44.9 and the SNS 35.7 percent. Vreme gives no figure for Authentic Right.

Thirteen days remain until the election, and Milenkovic said on the show that he “can hardly wait” for October 25 and believes it is a historic day for Serbia.