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| Back In Office: President Boris Tadic was reelected on Sunday. 'It is important that ... we all together set to improve the
lives of citizens.' Srdjan Ilic/AP |
Serbia's Tadic ekes out narrow, pro-Europe mandate
He won the presidency, but Radical Party's Nikolic will probably still be influential.
from the February 5, 2008 edition
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Nikolic, whose Radical Party leader, Voislav Seslj, is on trial for war crimes at The Hague, ran what by all accounts was an sophisticated campaign. He was widely rumored to be using a US consulting firm, though this is unconfirmed.
After winning Round 1 on Jan. 28 on a Kosovo, pro-Russia platform, Nikolic took a tack called here "compassionate radicalism" – a populist message of high oil and food costs, and the problems of corruption.
Nikolic shifted in the final days between appearing mild-mannered and heavily nationalist. He appeared at one point to threaten Tadic personally. In a country whose popular liberal reform Prime Minister Mr. Djinjic was assassinated in 2003, the incident raised fears.
"Nikolic went populist," says James Lyon of the International Crisis Group here. "The Radicals made themselves the party of change, saying 'We will make your life better.' "
"A man who accused Tadic of being a traitor and an Ustashe [a Croatian Nazi paramilitary group in World War II], now wants to be the man for all Serb citizens. It [was] a very slick campaign," says Vreme columnist Dejan Anastasijevic, who adds, "Serbia is on the brink. Kosovo is pushing us into confrontation with the EU. Europe is not doing much on Serbia that we can see. Russia beckons, largely due to the construction in Serbia of a pro-Russian lobby in the form of radical nationalists."
EU officials have vowed to move quickly toward discussions on opening the EU to Serbian visas, a desire here especially among a younger population that has seen little of the outside world since the late 1990s.
Serbia has a "crucial role to play in the Western Balkans, and the people of Serbia are part of the European family," the Slovene EU presidency stated. "The EU wishes to deepen its relationship with Serbia and to accelerate its progress towards the EU, including candidate status."
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