- Aleksandar Vučić, holder of the "Aleksandar Vučić - United Serbia" list, said in the "Hit Tweet" show on TV Pink that he believes that Student list lose the election by a margin of "hundreds of thousands of votes", because they focused the entire campaign on him personally.
- It claims to be the non-governmental sector, first of all THE LINE, directly involved in the campaign, that he provides logistics to the Student List and that after the elections he will claim that the elections were stolen.
- He also said that a large number of people in the security apparatus were under the influence of the "Montenegrin service", without naming names or evidence, and that he has nothing against people of other nationalities.
- He added that his list will admit the electoral defeat, but will not allow "someone to steal bags and ballots".
What happened
Speaking about the expectations for the elections, the former president of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, said that his opponents had a big advantage and invested a lot of money in the "overthrow" of the government, but that they made a tactical mistake because they focused everything on one point, on him, and if they had "dealt a little more broadly", they would have won.
According to him, "hate is a bad ally". He said that he is aware that one part of the candidates of the Student List believes that they can win, while others, as he claims, know that they are losing, and that everyone, when they see the difference, will first say that the elections were stolen. He asked what they would claim if the difference was 500.000 votes.
When asked why there are so many Montenegrins on the Student List, he replied that he had nothing against people of other nationalities, but that he was bothered by the influence of the "Montenegrin service" in the security apparatus, which he described as "anti-Serbian" and connected to drug cartels. The statements that were published did not provide concrete evidence for that claim.
He said for Crta that he "provides complete logistics" to the Student List and that there has never been a greater participation of the non-governmental sector as a political actor, and that in "minutes to 12" they will declare the elections unfair because "they know they are losing".
He also said that before the elections there was a "colored revolution" and that, as he said, it is difficult for him to respond to the campaign that presents him as a "non-human".
Why does he mention the Line?
At the end of June, Crta, together with Stanford University's Democracy Action Lab, published a survey conducted on a sample of 2324 adult citizens, according to which the Student List has 44,9 percent, SNS 35,7, and SPS 3,8 percent support. Vučić then assessed that the research was "unprofessional, frivolous and propagandistic" and that Crta "is not an objective observer".
Crta replied that the elections would have been called a long time ago if their data were not correct, and that Vučić's claim of 70 percent support for students was untrue. Crta is also organizing an observation mission for the elections on October 25.
Vučić also stated earlier that Crta is "under the baton of Western services". Such accusations are made in a campaign where, according to analysts, the conditions are unequal.
Why is this important?
Statements shape how the election result will be interpreted: if the government claims in advance that the difference is huge, any different assessment by observers or researchers gains political weight.
It is important for voters to distinguish political claims from verified facts, because statements about foreign or Montenegrin influence, funding of non-governmental organizations and "special war" are not supported by evidence in the published material.
For the civil sector and monitoring organizations, accusations of being part of the campaign can affect confidence in their findings on election day. For national minorities and citizens from Montenegro, statements about the candidate's nationality must not turn into labeling.
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