Photo: Ana Paunković/FoNetIt seems that there is no mechanism for manipulating the electoral process, and that it has not been perfected in Serbia. "Vreme" presents you with a case from the south of Serbia, where anyone could vote without ID, and even in the name of several people. We had access to police reports and statements of participants and eyewitnesses
The village of Svirce near Leskovac, election site no. 83, in the elementary school building, December 17, 2023. According to witnesses, the first irregularities were noticed shortly after the opening of the polling station. Upon inspection of the document, we learn that Dragan Ristić, a member of the electoral committee in front of the "Serbia against violence" coalition, reported the entire incident to the police on the same day.
"Around 08.30:XNUMX a.m., while I was inside the polling station, a person unknown to me came and demanded from the members of the commission to vote instead of his wife, to which they replied that he could vote," the police report states.
Ristić also confirmed for "Vreme" that he reported the irregularity to the police. He says he was the only one who rebelled and even wanted to record with his mobile phone how a man votes for two and how he registers twice, but the other members of the electoral committee attacked him.
"They shouted that I'm a traitor, that I have nothing to complain about, because 'they' always win and they didn't let me record everything because they kept saying that it was forbidden to record with a mobile phone at the polling station. Well, it turns out that irregularity and voting for more than one person is allowed, but video documenting it is not allowed," says Ristić.
However, that was not the end of the irregularities in the long election day.
What are you complaining about?
"During the voting, several people came to vote without ID cards, which I also considered an irregularity, because I don't know those people. When I told the other members of the commission that it can't be like that, they all started to 'explain' to me how they all know each other in the village and that they don't even need ID cards," the police document states.
According to the Law, in order for citizens of Serbia to exercise their right to vote, an identity card or other public document with a photo and unique identification number is a binding document that is given to the commission for inspection.
The voting, full of irregularities, according to Dragan Ristić, took place from hour to hour. He once again tried to stop everything that election week around 16:30, when he wrote a statement about all the irregularities he saw and handed it to the president of the election committee.
From that moment on, the situation at polling station 83 in the village of Svirce boiled over and a fight almost broke out. Several members of the commission sent a barrage of threats "we will find you" to Ristic, as well as hundreds of swear words and insults, and one of them, according to him, even tried to physically attack him. And while several members of the commission held a colleague who was swinging at Ristic to hit him, one of the voices from the crowd told him:
"You can see that the rest of the opposition are here, so no one is protesting except you, you are the only one who doesn't like this," it is stated in the documentation, which the journalists of the Vreme portal had access to.
And nothing to anyone
After that incident, Ristić left the polling station, and "it was already dark outside", he says, "so I was afraid that someone would damage my vehicle because of the previous discussion".
The polls had not yet closed, when Dragan Ristić began to testify before the police officers from Leskovac at 19:20.
To date, the Prosecutor's Office has not contacted him, and the police told him that "the investigation is ongoing".
On the territory of Leskovac, the ruling Serbian Progressive Party achieved a convincing victory. According to the "Južne vesti" portal, the elections in Leskovac were marked by allegations of numerous irregularities reported by CESID and representatives of the opposition, but the GIK and the RIK denied everything. A CESID observer was also verbally attacked and the police were informed about it.
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