Polls predict tight race in ‘historic’ Serb elections

SERBS went to the polls yesterday to choose local leaders in key elections expected to be a tight race between pro-Western reformers and loyalists of former President Slobodan Milosevic.

The municipal and mayoral elections are the first democratically organised since Milosevic was ousted four years ago.

Polls opened at 7am for more than six million eligible voters, choosing local assembly representatives in 148 municipalities and mayors in the four biggest cities, including the capital, Belgrade.

In the northern province of Vojvodina - where tensions between local Serbs and Hungarians have risen recently - citizens were also choosing a new regional assembly.

Leading pre-election surveys put the pro-Western Democratic Party and the ultra-nationalist Serbian Radical Party tied at the front of the race in most parts of the republic.

The newly-founded Strength of Serbia party, led by Serb billionaire Bogoljub Karic, was ranked third in the polls, while Prime Minister Vojislav Kostunica’s party was lagging in fourth.

The Democrats were predicted to regain the post of Belgrade mayor, while the Radicals were favoured in rural municipalities where their populist policies have appealed to poorer Serbs frustrated with the slow economic improvements.

Serbia’s President Boris Tadic, leader of the Democrats, said upon casting his ballot that he expected the elections to confirm the republic’s path toward Europe.

Mr Kostunica called the vote “historic” because it was Serbia’s first elections to be held in line with international standards.