Right-wing opposition leading the protests against the Brussels-Ohrid agreements, March 2023
Photo: Facebook / Miloš Jovanović
The first part of our analysis of the evolution of the party scene, focusing on the pro-EU opposition, is available here.
Right-wing opposition parties will participate in the December parliamentary elections on several lists. Attempts of unification failed in November, and the sides have accused each other of the inability to find a compromise.
However, the fragmented right-wing parties in Serbia have several common characteristics – a hard-line attitude towards the Kosovo issue, social conservatism and Euroscepticism.
Since 2012, after the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) came to power, no right-wing opposition party, whether independently or within a wider coalition, has reached 10% of votes in parliamentary elections. The latest polls suggest that this will not be the case in thos election either.
Despite the fluctuations in the election results, the majority of right-wing anti-EU parties maintained continuity in their activities and presence on the political scene in the past decade.
2012 to 2016: A decline
In the 2012 parliamentary elections, the only subsequent right-wing opposition party to pass the threshold was Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS). The leader of the party at that time was Vojislav Koštunica, former president of Yugoslavia, who defeated Slobodan Milošević in 2000. DSS used support Serbia’s EU membership, but turned Eurosceptic after Kosovo declared independence in 2008 which was recognized by the majority of EU members.
In the 2012 elections, two additional parties from the right were close to passing the threshold but did not win seats. One was the ultra-nationalist Serbian Radical Party (SRS) of Vojislav Šešelj, then an indictee before the Hague Tribunal. Majority of SRS voters went to the reformed Serbian Progressive Party, which split away from the Radicals in 2008. Until the split, SRS continuously won the largest number of votes in the Serbian elections, but was never able to form a government.
The second party that failed to enter the parliament was the Serbian movement “Dveri”, an ultra-conservative and nationalist organization, which evolved from the parts of the conservative civil society in Serbia.
Snap parliamentary election in 2014 brought a new decline of right-wing parties, since none of them entered the parliament. For the first time since the renewal of multipartysm in Serbia, all parties in the parliament were declaratively pro-EU.
DSS lost part of its support and fell below the threshold, after which Vojislav Koštunica retired from the party and politics in general. An additional decrease in the number of votes was also recorded by the Serbian movement “Dveri” led by Boško Obradović, who became the party’s president just before the 2014 election. Serbian Radical Party (SRS) experienced further drop in support.
2016 to 2020: Šešelj’s return and the founding of the new parties
In the following snap election in 2016, the right-wing opposition parties returned to the parliament.
Vojislav Šešelj, who was released from the Hague Tribunal in 2014, re-entered politics as the leader of the Serbian Radical Party. His return brought the party its best election result since 2008 and SRS won 8% of votes, becoming nominally the strongest opposition party in parliament.
Nevertheless, following the election, SRS greatly toned down its criticism of Aleksandar Vučić and SNS and directed its activities against the pro-EU opposition. Its status as “loyal opposition” to Vučić soon diminished its support, which has not crossed 3% since.
Before the 2016 elections, the first major coalition on the right was created, when Democratic Party of Serbia and Serbian movement “Dveri” joined forces. What they failed to do separately in 2014, the parties achieved together in 2016, entering parliament, though at the very edge of the electoral threshold. Despite the success, due to internal party disputes, DSS leader and Koštunica’s successor Sanda Rašković Ivić was soon replaced by Miloš Jovanović, the current leader of the party.
In the following period, new political parties appeared on the right-wing spectrum. In 2017, the Movement for the Renewal of the Kingdom of Serbia (POKS) was founded as a conservative and monarchist party. Its current leader is Vojislav Miahilović, grandson of WWII Chetnik leader Draža Mihailović and a participant of political life in Serbia since the 1990s.
Two years later, Serbian Party “Zavetnici” was constituted, having functioned as an ultra-nationalist movement before. It has since been headed by Milica Đurđević Stamenkovski, a political scientist who started her career in the Serbian Radical Party.
In 2020, regular parliamentary elections were held, which the pro-EU opposition boycotted due to poor election conditions. Serbian movement “Dveri” also participated in the boycott. Other parties went to the elections independently, but none of them crossed the threshold.
After the election, the only seemingly opposition party became conservative SPAS led by Aleksandar Šapić. However, Šapić supported the government and his party soon merged with SNS. He became the mayor of Belgrade, nominated by SNS, in 2022.
2020-2023: New coalitions and the second return to the parliament
In the period before the extraordinary parliamentary elections in 2022, new coalitions were formed on the right spectrum of the political scene. In 2021, Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS) and POKS formed the National Democratic Alternative – NADA coalition (which in Serbian also means “hope”). In the meantime, one POKS faction broke away and in 2022 formed a short-term pre-election coalition with the Serbian movement “Dveri.”
In the parliamentary elections in 2022, three right-wing anti-EU options entered the parliament. NADA coalition won 5.5% of votes, while Dveri-POKS coalition and Serbian Party “Zavetnici”, which ran independently, won an almost identical number of votes, around 3.8%.
In the December 2023 election, the NADA coalition (DSS and POKS) will participate in the same form as a year earlier. On the occasion of the 30-year anniversary since the party was founded, DSS renamed itself to the New Democratic Party of Serbia (NDSS) in 2022.
Serbian movement “Dveri” and Serbian party “Zavetnici” have now formed the National Rally coalition, which is expected to achieve the best result among the opposition lists.
A new option on the right is People’s Party (NS), led by Vuk Jeremić, former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Serbia. In 2023 NS, which previously cooperated with the pro-EU parties, took the stance of rejection of the Brussels-Ohrid agreement for Kosovo and Serbia’s EU membership. It is unclear whether the party will cross the 3% threshold.
The same uncertainty applies to the Enough is Enough (DJB) party, which entered the parliament in 2016 as a technocratic libearal-leaning organisation, but it adopted more conservative and Eurosceptic stances in the following years. It is now in a coalition with the Social Democratic Party (SDS) of the former President of Serbia Boris Tadić.
