Russian party achieves “Historic success” in Serbia, Vucic says he doesn’t know members who were in his party

A Russian party in Serbia that took part in the last elections has achieved a “historic success”, proving Serbs’ support for Russian policies in this country.

The Russian party, of which President Aleksandar Vucic said: “I don’t know who they are”, will have its representative in the republican and provincial parliament.

However, Vucic should actually know about this party, as the people heading its list have been prominent members of Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), Vucic’s party, for years.

The Russian party will have one representative in the National Assembly, the list bearer and party chairman Slobodan Nikolic, while there will also be one or possibly two deputies in the Vojvodina Assembly, depending on the distribution of seats.

It is therefore certain that Ljubica Bertovic, a psychologist from Subotica and first on the provincial list, who was otherwise a prominent member of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) ruling in Subotica, will enter the provincial parliament.

At the republic level, the Russian Party won 0.3 percent and at the provincial level 1 percent of the vote, and after receiving minority status (16 Republic Election Commission (RIK) members were in favor, 10 voted against and one abstained), these numbers are enough for it to become a parliamentary party.

This party was founded in 2013 in Sabac and its chairman, Slobodan Nikolic, is an economist by profession, but also the chairman of the Serbian-Russian friendship association “Vladimir Putin”.

He worked in the association “Srpski prag 98”, which helps local bachelors to marry women from Russia. He was a candidate and member of the Sabac City Council for two terms and a councillor in the city parliament.

“In the name of birthrate”, this party had spoken out in favor of a ban on abortion.

The Russian party participated in the provincial elections for the first time and the first on the list, Ljubica Bertović, is deputy director at “Park Palić” and director of the “Business Incubator” in Subotica founded by the city.

She is a representative of the Subotica branch of the “Svetozar Miletic” Foundation, which was founded in Novi Sad by the current State Secretary Nemanja Starovic, and was a member of the local municipal council “Dudova Suma” before the SNS-SVM coalition in 2019.

She is known in Subotica as a longtime active member of Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), Vucic’s party, as evidenced by her numerous posts on social networks, but before these elections she deactivated her accounts on all social networks.

In the pre-election interview, she said that it was clear to her who she could not cooperate with. So, in short, with the opposition, because things were going well with Vucic.

“We are absolutely sure that we will not conclude a coalition agreement with the so-called false right patriotic bloc and those options that would sell out the state and its national interests in order to return to power,” Bertovic said.

Denis Kolundzija, a journalist from Cenzolovka who has been following the work of the Vojvodina Assembly for decades, says that he does not know the representatives on the provincial list of the Russian party, except for Bertovic, who is mentioned as a member of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS).

“Usually the lists that are suspected of how they collected votes end up getting fewer votes than they had signatures, for example Cedomir Jovanovic’s party.” But this time it wasn’t like that for the Russian party, they got three times more votes than the signatures. We didn’t see them in the election campaign, we didn’t hear where and when they were collecting signatures, what their program was, where their stands were and so on. Was it all on social networks and Telegram channels, in a parallel universe to ours, as is the case with Dr. Nestorovic’s list, it is possible,” Kolundzija said./The Geopost/