Municipal elections are conducted at Belgrade and in 67 other cities in Serbia. In the capital, it is a repeat election since in the previous election, last December, no party gained independence in the municipal council to be able to elect a mayor. The repeat of the elections in Belgrade was also a request of the Serbian opposition which complained that there were irregularities in the December elections.

All polling stations opened today as normal at 7:00 in the morning and will close at 8:00 in the evening. According to an estimate by the polling company IPSOS, the voter turnout in Belgrade was 5.8% until 9:00 a.m. and is slightly higher than in the December elections.

The opposition complains that irregularities were found in Belgrade with the movement of voters and the operation of call centers of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS). The municipal elections in Serbia are monitored by 150 OSCE observers.

In all municipalities where elections are held on SNS descends on a joint ballot with the Socialist Party (SPS) and eleven other smaller parties. The combination is named after him President of the Republic Aleksandar Vucic who led the election campaign.

The opposition parties they disagreed about the need to participate in the elections and thus the coalition “Serbia Against Violence” which emerged as the second force in Belgrade in the December elections, split. The largest parties of the coalition decided to abstain from the elections arguing that there are no conditions for conducting a democratic electoral process. For the same reason, the right-wing nationalist coalition “Hope” is not participating in the elections. (NADA) who in the December elections in Belgrade was the third force.

From the opposition, five parties from the coalition “Serbia against violence” are participating in the municipal elections. These are centre-right, social-democratic and left-wing parties that are running on a single ballot. The participation in the elections of the citizens’ movement “Start-‘Alaxe” is of interest (Kreni – Promeni) led by the 38-year-old lawyer Savo Manoilovic.

This movement has had many actions in recent years for ecological problems, in favor of the democratization of the country and against corruption.

The split in the opposition gives his coalition a better chance Aleksandar Vucic to prevail in all major municipalities in Serbia, analysts estimate.