Photo: Time / Katarina StevanoviฤWhile Belgrade is filled with protesters on June 28, in Budva, Montenegro, a cafe becomes a symbol of paradox: people from Serbia working temporarily in Montenegro are watching a protest against the regime from which they have moved, at least temporarily, on the screen
The TV connected to the computer has been on all day since the broadcast of the Vidovdan protest began. The transmission of television N1 is being watched. Several people, waiters and bar owners in the Old Town of Budva, follows every minute of the rally in Belgrade and every step taken by the tens of thousands gathered.
They follow the television program and social networks in parallel.
The wife and children of one of the attendees just managed to meet at Slavia, while he monitors their locations on their phones minute by minute.
It's not a sport
The engrossment in the events is interrupted by the question of a girl who comes to the bar and says confusedly: "What sport is this?". She is probably used to similar scenes when sporting events are followed in the bar.
"It's not a sport, it's a protest in Belgrade," adds one of the attendees.
"Well, it makes sense, maybe the protests could be classified as a new sport," someone quips with a smile.
Someone decides to switch channels and see how the Serbian pro-regime media is covering the protest. Spend a few minutes with Informer and Kurir television, then back to N1.
A new guest arrives and asks: "Why are we only watching N1? Let's see the other side as well."
"We watched it - it's boring", replies the man who previously flipped the channels and left the N1 television on.
Those gathered are commenting on the announcement of the Ministry of the Interior that there are 36.000 people at the meeting.
"And last time they announced that it was three, four times less."
Are there any similarities with the demolition of Milo?
And are there similarities between the years-long overthrow of Milo and the attempt to overthrow the government in Serbia?
Months of protests and liturgies followed the fall of the Montenegrin President of Montenegro, Milo ฤukanoviฤ, in 2023, who had been in power for more than 30 years. The drop in the bucket full of dissatisfaction were the disputes over the position of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Montenegro.
Protests and liturgies contributed, that is, mixed attitudes about the position of the church in Montenegro.
Commenting that he hopes the protests in Serbia will lead to regime change, one of the guests compares the protests in Serbia with the situation in Montenegro a few years ago.
"There are similarities. We in Montenegro were also determined and persistent, like citizens in Serbia led by students today," he tells me.
The difference is that in Montenegro the church was attacked, he adds.
"But it's the same - Milo attacked the church, Vuฤiฤ hit the children," replied the gentleman whose children were at the rally in Belgrade.
What will happen after 21 pm?
Everyone is patiently waiting for 21 p.m. to see what will happen.
Many hope that the situation in Serbia will change on Saturday evening, that Aleksandar Vuฤiฤ, the president of the republic, will admit defeat.
Among those gathered are several Serbs working temporarily on the Montenegrin coast.
There is also a girl, a student, of Montenegrin origin, who studies in Novi Sad.
She also follows the program and comments on the information she receives from her colleagues from Belgrade.
Until today, she had not heard that the "Serbia train" had stopped the traffic.
In the hope that things will change in Serbia, she says ironically: "And I also found when to ask for Serbian citizenship", she comments ironically.
Everyone is hoping for some kind of change, but they are not the most optimistic.
"Everything is the same as every time", says one of them, originally from Belgrade, adding that it annoys him when the speaker reads the speech from the phone, which one of the protest participants is doing right now.
Everyone expects something new and hopes for change.
The students who before Saturday's protest gave the citizens a "green light" and invited them to join the changes are also calling for change.
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The student movement and future MPs are seeking an agreement on who decides on the composition and program of the new Government, writes "Vreme" in its new issue. While the consultations are ongoing, the program of more than a thousand pages is already ready
For Aleksandar Vuฤiฤ, the consequences of the change of his government will be economic collapse, departure of foreign investors from Serbia, mass layoffs, jeopardy of pension payments, instability of the banking system, spread of crime. All in all - a cataclysm
In the midst of the arrests of politicians and businessmen after the defeat of the Aleksandar Vuฤiฤ regime in the elections, the controversial businessman Zvonko Veselinoviฤ traveled to Turkey.
The Higher Public Prosecutor's Office in Belgrade rejects the report of the Supreme Public Prosecution Commission as "malicious" and "baseless", accusing its members of exceeding their powers and intimidating prosecutors.
At the moment when the institutions of the Republic are destroyed, when Vuฤiฤ's octopus is still alive, when people are disgusted by the injustice and the stench left behind by the Essenes regime, we have, as Machiavelli said, only civic virtue as the fuel with which we can return to the beginning
The four independent members of REM are an example of perseverance and civic responsibility. Rodoljub ล abiฤ even, upon leaving the premises of REM, after the sentencing of the Informer, experienced that the Essenes insulted him, hit him with their hands and feet. But that too will soon be over
Vuฤiฤ pardoned the batterers and Dijana Hrkaloviฤ. The election winners should abolish the sultan's power that allows one man to run afoul of the entire judicial system
Interview: Branko Stamenkoviฤ, public prosecutor of the Supreme Public Prosecutor's Office
A black picture and the breakdown of the rule of law subscribeThe archive of the weekly Vreme includes all our digital editions, since the very beginning of our work. All issues can be downloaded in PDF format, by purchasing the digital edition, or you can read all available texts from the selected issue.
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