Vucic claims Albanian parties ceded polling board seats

Aleksandar Vucic, the lead candidate of the “Aleksandar Vucic - United Serbia” list, claims that representatives of Albanian parties gave up their seats on polling boards for the October 25 parliamentary elections to the Student List, on the orders of Albin Kurti. Vucic made the claim on October 14 in a post on his Instagram account “avucic”. In the post, as reported by the media, there is no number of seats handed over and no names of the parties’ representatives, and the claim has not been independently verified.

Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) president Milos Vucevic followed up on X, where he called Kurti the one true principal and sponsor of the Student List.

What does Vucic claim about Kurti and the polling boards?

Vucic describes the arrangement as a political act by his opponents, not a technical decision about the makeup of the boards. He opened his post with these words:

“Everything I thought our political opponents would try to avoid - I believe it would have been smarter for them - they did not avoid. Thank you to them. They made the most important agreement, a strategic agreement, a coalition agreement with Albin Kurti and the political parties from central Serbia that obey him.”

He goes on to say how, in his version, the deal came about. Kurti, Vucic says, gathered representatives of all three Albanian parties and ordered them to run in a coalition, after which they offered their polling board seats to the Student List. He cites examples from two cities:

“And you can see for yourselves: from Subotica, where representatives of the ZLF, which is a student movement, became election observers through the Albanian list of Saip Kamberi and Albin Kurti, to Cacak and Stojan Markovic, who would like Saip Kamberi to back him - the same Saip Kamberi who is an Albanian extremist supporting not only the secession of Kosovo but also calling Serbs a genocidal people - so, once again, these are such outpourings of love that it is completely unbelievable.”

ZLF stands for the Green-Left Front.

He also turned the message toward the region. In his words, “what remains is to show people, so they understand why Pristina and Zagreb and Sarajevo and Podgorica have so zealously supported the ‘Student List’ from the start to this day, and will keep supporting it.” He closed the post with an appeal to voters: “And for us to know and to bear in mind, Serbian sisters, Serbian brothers, and other citizens of Serbia: whom will we trust on the 25th.”

He spoke from the yard of his family home in Jajinci, where he showed unpicked apples and rosemary. “I will prepare all of this and bring it on the 25th to the party headquarters, so we can celebrate together, we have no shortage of rosemary,” he said, alluding to the song “Rosemary” by Merima Njegomir, which has become a trademark of the list’s rallies.

How did Vucevic respond?

Vucevic also reacted to a statement from the Party for Freedom, Justice and Survival, led by Nenad Rasic, the minister for communities and returns in the government in Pristina. That party said that support for students is important at this moment. Vucevic tied it to Vucic’s claim:

“It is now officially clear what we have been telling the citizens of Serbia for months - the so-called student blockader list has only one real principal and sponsor, and that is Albin Kurti.”

Vucevic, then, says the claim about Kurti as the campaign’s principal has been around for months, and Vucic’s post adds to it the claim about polling boards. Of Rasic he wrote: “When you receive open and unreserved support from Nenad Rasic, a man who serves as a loyal pawn in Kurti’s government and a silent observer of terror against the Serbian people in Kosovo and Metohija, there is no longer any doubt about what kind of project this is.”

Support coming from Pristina, according to Vucevic, is no coincidence but a direct attempt to destabilize Serbia ahead of the October 25 elections. He concluded his message this way:

“We are telling Kurti and Rasic and their Belgrade lackeys: the citizens of Serbia see very well who fights for our people and who takes instructions from Pristina. On October 25, the people of Serbia will send a clear and convincing message at the elections - Serbia does not bend to ultimatums and will not allow Albin Kurti and his underlings to shape its fate. Serbia will win.”

What remains unanswered?

In the posts we reviewed, there is no response from the Student List or the Albanian parties to these claims. It is also not stated how many polling board seats were allegedly handed over, in which municipalities, or under what agreement. Ten days remain until the October 25 elections.