Now that he has won a second term, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, who wants to lead his country into the EU but remains loyal to Moscow, has to decide what to do with his strong mandate, write for Deutsche Welle Volker Wagener
The result of the Serbian election was more or less a foregone conclusion. Aleksandar Vucic, the giant with a babyface, won the election. The new president is the old one. Even if one wants to delegitimize him by describing him as an autocrat or the leader of a “hybrid democracy,” there is no doubt that this powerbroker, who has held various positions in the past 10 years, has an economic recipe for success.
Even though many young Serbs are prepared to leave the country in search of greener pastures, if they have not already moved to Frankfurt or Vienna, voters apparently wanted to show their gratitude to Vucic for the country’s economic revival. The GDP per capita has risen by a remarkable 40% in the past five years, unemployment is falling, the national debt is low, and the country of seven million can boast abundant foreign exchange reserves.
With the war in Ukraine, Serbia’s relationship with Russia, a cosying up characterized in the past as “pathological love,” is undergoing a stress test.
One could say that Serbia does not know what it wants. Like Yugoslavian leader Tito in his day, Vucic has oscillated between East and West. Serbia receives gas from its “best friend” Russia at a discount, but at the same time — over the past 15 years — it has received subsidies of around €3 billion from the EU’s Pre-Accession Assistance program.
Since 2014, Serbia’s negotiations with Brussels to join the bloc have been dragging on. But the Russia-Ukraine War has injected new impetus into the half-hearted accession talks. After years of Brussels repeating a mantra of demands of the states of the Western Balkans, the door to the EU is now wide open. The issues at hand are no longer rule of law, free media, or corruption. Today, the EU wants to protect the countries of southeastern Europe — particularly Serbia — from Putin’s foreign political clutches. Belgrade now needs to make up its mind.
