Photo: Dragan Kujundžić/TanjugJust as an epidemic was needed to establish new forms of control over citizens, a new custom was also established: give people a few tens of euros before the elections, and they will give you good returns. This has already reached 30 billion euros of public debt, which someone will pay back with interest
It was known before: the economy did not like elections, because everything stops for a few months both before and after the vote - first of all the campaign, then who was elected, then who would like to go with these, but not with those, and so on until the election of the government. But that was once upon a time, when it was not known who would win the elections and when there was actually a change of government, as one of the basic democratic achievements.
Now, as in the last ten years, Serbia has no such problems - no uncertainty, no government crisis, no overvoting in the Assembly. Serbia has no problem with the reality that elections serve only to check the current rating of the president, and the economy does not have to worry about the date of the election either: the election campaign lasts 24 hours every day, on all available channels, in all media and on all social networks.
However, the government spends money not only on commercials, advertisements, friendly television and newspapers, PR texts or shooting countless videos for Instagram and Facebook. Since the beginning of the epidemic, the government has literally been bribing people - giving them money to make it easier for them to circle the correct name or list on the ballot (of course, if the citizens have oil, sugar, detergent, firewood, one "red", a Bulgarian train, mandatory painting of the ballot and the jeeps without license plates that are carelessly speeding between polling stations were not convincing enough arguments).
Truth be told, it used to happen a few years ago that pensioners, arbitrarily, received 3-5 thousand dinars once a year, that is, to help them (regardless of the fact that all pensioners received this help, even those whose pension is higher than the average wages). However, just as an epidemic was needed to establish new forms of control over citizens, so a new custom was established: give people a few tens of euros before the elections and they will give you good returns.
Those first 100 euros of aid from the spring of 2020 cost the state about 620 million euros. Help was received by those who need much more than 100 euros and those for whom that 100 euros meant nothing, and it is suspected that it did not reach the most vulnerable - those who do not have an identity card, residence, electricity, internet, telephone and could not apply.
This aid could still "pass" as aid to citizens due to the covid-crisis, although the entire economic profession, headed by the Fiscal Council, condemned this "helicopter money" as an unnecessary waste of money that Serbia does not have, but is already in debt ( let's remind you that this year Serbia will also take money from the IMF, around 890 million euros, which it refused last year and the year before, because "we have money"). Two years later, almost no one asks, nor bothers to explain what these new 100 euros are for (for citizens aged 16-29) and 20.000 dinars for pensioners. The elections are in April, and that's the only thing that matters, and who will pay back the money with interest - we'll think about it tomorrow.
How much of the citizens' money did the government spend by borrowing for these purposes? The mentioned 620 million euros in the spring of 2020; about 500 million at 30+30+20 euros to all citizens during 2021; about 35 million euros to 60 euros for the unemployed in June 2021; about 85 million on an additional 50 euros for pensioners in September 2021. In total, we are already at more than 1,2 billion euros, not including about 25 million euros spent on 3000 dinars rewards for vaccinated citizens.
Add to that about 285 million for new aid to pensioners of 20.000 dinars each and about 105 million euros for young people, and we are already over a billion and a half euros given for citizens to vote correctly in the next elections. To make matters worse, it has happened several times - and even now, with the "youth allowance" - that the Parliament has just adopted a new budget or a rebalance, and that the president comes up with a new action of giving money from citizens to citizens, which completely disrupts the newly adopted (the most important ) law.
And the account is "ticking", it is already over 30 billion euros of public debt, with a fairly certain increase in interest rates if inflation does not calm down during the first six months of this year.
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