Serbia: 2004 Presidential Elections
CRS Report for Congress
Serbia: 2004 Presidential Elections
Julie Kim
Specialist in International Relations
Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Trade Division
Summary
Serbia, the larger republic within the Serbia and Montenegro union, held
presidential elections on June 13 and 27, 2004. While the actual powers of the
republican presidency are not very extensive, the election outcome was expected to
signal the political direction of Serbia and its prospects for closer relations with the
international community. In the first round of voting, Tomislav Nikolic, leader of the
extremist Serbian Radical Party, and Boris Tadic, candidate of the opposition
Democratic Party, came in first and second place in front of 13 other candidates. In the
second round, Tadic defeated Nikolic, 54% to 45%. Calling the results a victory for “a
European future” over radical nationalism, Tadic pledged to guide the country closer to
European Union membership. However, Tadic’s victory may trigger still more political
changes, including early parliamentary elections. A related CRS product is CRS Report
RL30371, Serbia and Montenegro: Current Situation and U.S. Policy, by Steven
Woehrel.
Background
The political situation in Serbia has been notable for high volatility at least since the
end of the Kosovo war in mid-1999. In October 2000, wartime President Slobodan
Milosevic was forced from power by pro-democracy forces including opposition parties
and grass-roots civic groups. These forces, mostly encompassed in the broad-based
Democratic Opposition in Serbia (DOS) coalition, came into office and launched new
reforms, but progress stalled in part because of inter-party disagreements. The rivalry
between then-Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica (and his party, the Democratic Party
of Serbia, DSS) and then-Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic (of the Democratic Party,
DS) became particularly divisive. The tiny Republic of Montenegro continued to press
for independence from Serbia but acquiesced in 2002 to an EU-brokered arrangement to
realign the old Federal Republic of Yugoslavia into a loose state union of Serbia and
Montenegro, which came into force in February 2003. In March of that year, Serbian
Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic was assassinated allegedly by organized criminal groups
threatened by Djindjic’s reform policies. Power was smoothly transferred to a successor
DS-led government, but early parliamentary elections held in December produced strong
results for Serbia’s nationalist parties, with the extremist Radical Party winning the largest
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share of the vote and seats in parliament, although not enough to form a government.
After months of negotiations, Kostunica became Prime Minister of a DSS-led minority
coalition (without the Radical Party) in March 2004, while the DS opted to go into
opposition. Milosevic’s Socialist Party supports the Kostunica government in parliament.
In part because of ongoing political instability, Serbia has lagged in some aspects of
reform, and in its efforts to integrate with the international community and overcome
Serbia’s troubled recent history. At the same time, developments in Serbia and
Montenegro can strongly influence regional stability and affect broader regional issues
such as the unresolved conflict in Kosovo, the status of the International Criminal
Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), and EU enlargement plans in the western
Balkan region. For these reasons, the mid-2004 Serbian presidential election attracted a
great deal of attention within Serbia and without. While the actual powers of the
republican presidency are not very extensive, the election outcome was expected to loom
large in Serbian national politics and influence Serbia’s relations with the international
community.
Serbian Presidency
The limited powers of the Serbian presidency derive from the Serbia and
Montenegro Constitutional Charter that came into force in February 2003,1 and the
Serbian republic constitution, which is currently under revision. The Serbian president
is directly elected and has certain appointive and policy-related powers at both the
republic and union levels. Notably, the two republic presidents serve on the Supreme
Defense Council along with the union president. However, most governing power lies
with the republic-level prime minister and cabinet. Moreover, the state union remains a
single international entity and retains among its few powers the conduct of international
relations. Therefore, the Serbian president, representing a constituent republic, does not
act as a sovereign “head of state” in an international context.
The last person to hold the post of President of Serbia on a full-time basis was Milan
Milutinovic, who is currently in custody at The Hague and charged with war crimes
relating to his decision-making authority during the 1999 Kosovo conflict. After
Milutinovic’s term expired at the end of 2002, Serbia held three direct presidential
elections prior to 2004: in October and December 2002, and in November 2003. Each
time, the results were invalidated due to low voter turnout (less than 50%).2 In the 2003
vote, Serbian Radical Party candidate Tomislav Nikolic came in first with about 46% of
the vote. Some parties boycotted that process and turnout was less than 40%. In the
absence of an elected president, the president of the Serbian parliament acted as caretaker
Serbian president from 2003 until July 2004.
1 For more information, see CRS Report RS21568, Serbia and Montenegro Union: Prospects and
Policy Implications, by Julie Kim.
2 In both 2002 presidential elections, then-federal president Vojislav Kostunica of the Serbian
Democratic Party (DSS) won a clear majority of the vote. Voter apathy, which produced low
turnouts that invalidated each process, appeared to suit the interests of the government of then-
Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic, given its ongoing bitter feud with Kostunica after the fall of
Milosevic in October 2000.
For the 2004 vote, the Serbian parliament abolished the 50% voter turnout threshold
for both rounds of the election. Therefore, a candidate could claim victory either by
winning over 50% of the vote in the first round or prevailing in the second round between
the top two contenders. Low voter turnout could not invalidate the results.
Candidates
Fifteen individuals were approved by the Serbian Electoral Commission to run for
president. The leading candidates were Tomislav Nikolic, leader of the extreme
nationalist Serbian Radical Party; Boris Tadic, candidate of the opposition Democratic
Party; and Dragan Marsicanin, candidate of the governing coalition under Prime Minister
Kostunica. Nikolic is the acting head of the Radical Party in the absence of its leader,
Vojislav Seselj, who is currently in custody at The Hague on charges of war crimes.
During part of the 1990s, the Radical Party shared power with Slobodan Milosevic’s
Socialist Party. Tadic of the Democratic Party served as defense minister under Djindjic
and Djindjic’s successor, Prime Minister Zivkovic, and is widely credited for carrying out
major reforms in the armed forces during his tenure at the defense ministry. Representing
the current government, Marsicanin had the formal backing of the DSS and its coalition
partners, but was considered a weaker representative of the government than either Prime
Minister Kostunica or Deputy Prime Minister Labus. A fourth prominent candidate was
Bogoljub Karic, an independent businessman and media mogul. The inclusion of many
additional candidates was thought by some to encourage greater turnout in the first round,
although others feared that the participation of many non-serious candidates could feed
voter apathy.
Most pre-election opinion polls showed Nikolic leading with about 30% or higher
levels of support. In many polls, Tadic came in second with about 20% or higher, with
Marsicanin ranking third, depending on the poll. However, a large share of persons polled
said they were undecided. The level of turnout was considered to be another key factor
in the final outcome.3
Notably absent from the 2004 list of candidates was Vojislav Kostunica, who ran in
both failed presidential elections in 2002. His absence reflected changed political
circumstances. In 2002, Kostunica was serving as president of the Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia, which no longer exists in that form, and the Democratic Party under Prime
Minister Djindjic controlled most levers of governing power. After the December 2003
parliamentary elections, Kostunica’s DSS party became the leading party in the governing
coalition and Kostunica himself became Serbian prime minister, a position of much
greater power than the Serbian presidency. Given this situation, Kostunica expressed
greater interest in fulfilling his governing mandate as prime minister than in running for
a less significant office. Nevertheless, many observers initially rued his choice not to run,
given that Kostunica might have been best able to unite the badly fractured pro-
democratic bloc and present the strongest alternative to the Radical Party’s Nikolic.
3 “Serb Presidency Poll Could Become Tight Race,” Reuters, May 19, 2004; “Serbian Poll
Suggests SRS’s Nikolic To Win Presidential Vote,” BBC Monitoring European, June 1, 2004;
“Serbia’s Presidential Election Likely to Go to Run-Off,” Agence France Presse, June 2, 2004.
Campaign
Even before the official start of the election campaign, it was apparent that the
democratic bloc would remain fragmented by virtue of its inability to back a single
candidate. Before the vote, government leaders argued that it would have been impossible
to support Tadic, since his Democratic Party was in the opposition, and they therefore put
forward Marsicanin as the coalition candidate. The bigger question that was left open to
speculation was whether all pro-democracy parties would unite behind a non-nationalist
candidate in the second round, if the race came down to one of them against the Radicals’
Nikolic. Prior to the first round, however, such cooperation at least between the DSS and
DS appeared questionable. Officials from both parties exchanged sharp recriminations
on a range of issues; a prominently featured dispute involved the circumstances
surrounding the 2003 Djindjic assassination, the ensuing enforcement actions of the
successor DS government, and the alleged complicity of both parties in the murder. Some
media commentary observed that the bitter campaign disputes could negatively affect
voter turnout among supporters of moderate candidates, and thereby work to boost the
proportional strength of the extremists.
For his part, Nikolic attempted to build on the SRS’ successful approach to the
December 2003 parliamentary elections, in which the party downplayed its ultra-
nationalist roots and emphasized populist concerns and voter discontent with social and
economic conditions. He campaigned on assurances that his victory would not lead to
Serbia’s isolation. However, EU officials warned that Serbia under a Radical Party
leadership could not count on EU support. EU members had already expressed concerns
about political developments in Serbia following the December parliamentary vote.4
The outburst in mid-March 2004 of deadly, ethnically-motivated attacks against Serb
communities in Kosovo returned the volatile and unresolved issue of Kosovo to the
Serbian political scene.5 In response, the Kostunica government put forward a detailed
plan to create autonomous units for Kosovo Serb residents as part of a larger
decentralization effort for the Kosovo province. While the plan itself has received mixed
initial reactions abroad, some observers believe that the Serbian government has
benefitted politically from its prompt and internationally engaged response to the recent
violence. Moreover, swift Serbian governmental and parliamentary approval of the
decentralization plan for Kosovo helped to remove the hot-button issue of Kosovo as a
central theme — and a potential rallying point for nationalist forces — in the presidential
campaign.
In early May, the Serbian political scene was further shaken by the sudden
appearance and voluntary surrender in Belgrade of Milorad “Legija” Lukovic, the prime
suspect for organizing the Djindjic assassination and the former leader of the “Red
Berets” special operations unit in the Serbian police force. Lukovic disappeared after the
March 2003 murder and remained in hiding for over a year. Lukovic appeared in court
4 Press conference by NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer and Javier Solana, EU
High Representative for CFSP, May 24, 2004; “EU Urges New Serbian Government to Stick to
Reforms,” Agence France Presse, February 25, 2004.
5 For further information see CRS Report RL31053, Kosovo and U.S. Policy, by Steven Woehrel
and Julie Kim.
for the first time in June and entered a plea of not guilty. His initial testimony included
charges of links between former officials of the DS-led government and organized crime.
Results 6
In the first round of voting on June 13, no single candidate won a majority of the
vote. Nikolic received the highest share of votes (30.60%), and Tadic came in second
with 27.37%; both were assured of participation in the second round. A surprise third
place showing with 18.23% was media mogul Bogoljub Karic, whose campaign message
on job creation may have drawn off some of Nikolic’s potential supporters. Marsicanin,
the government’s candidate, came in a disappointing fourth with 13.30%. Voter turnout
in the first round was 47.75%.
In the immediate aftermath of the first round, there was widespread speculation that,
in response to Marsicanin’s poor showing, Prime Minister Kostunica might resign and
thereby bring down the government and trigger early parliamentary elections. After
Kostunica issued a formal denial to these rumors, the next question was whether he would
back Tadic for the second round. The three DSS coalition partners (G-17 Plus, Serbian
Renewal Movement, and New Serbia party) immediately lent their support to Tadic.
Kostunica first met individually with both Tadic and Nikolic, but after a few days the DSS
formally endorsed Tadic for the second round. Third-place candidate Karic also backed
Tadic. However, it remained to be seen to what extent the voter base of these parties
would abide by the endorsements of their party leaders or even participate in the process.
Therefore, another preoccupation for the reformist parties before the second round was
to counter apathy and encourage greater voter participation among their supporters.
In the second round on June 27, Tadic defeated Nikolic by a vote of 53.53% to
45.10%. Among the motivating factors favoring Tadic, according to some media
analyses, may have been concerns about the consequences of a Nikolic victory and a
perception among voters that Tadic was better suited to lead the country out of isolation,
promote international support for Serbia, and improve economic prospects. Nikolic
conceded defeat but upheld his call for early parliamentary elections, with the apparent
expectation of another strong Radical Party result. With the backing of a much broader
base than the traditional Democratic Party supporters, Tadic nearly doubled his votes from
the first round. Voter turnout in the second round was 48.28% — still an overall low
figure, but higher than some expected for a second round of voting. Tadic is to be
inaugurated in early July under a five-year term.
For both rounds of voting, international observers assessed that democratic standards
for a free and fair electoral process had been met. The international response to Tadic’s
victory was one of congratulations and probably some relief. EU foreign policy chief
Javier Solana welcomed Tadic’s victory and called him a “friend of Europe.”7
6 Results data summarized from various news agencies and international organizations, including
the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
7 Financial Times, June 29, 2004.
Potential Implications for U.S. Policy
Following the formation of the Kostunica government in March 2004, U.S. officials
emphasized that the United States would judge the Serbian government on its actions and
that the Administration stood ready to assist Serbia on the path toward Euro-Atlantic
integration, provided that Serbia met its international obligations.8 After Djindjic’s
murder in 2003, U.S. and Serbian officials sought to strengthen bilateral relations and
cooperation; despite some areas of progress, cooperation in other areas became stalled
primarily over assessments of still limited Serbian cooperation with the war crimes
Tribunal. This issue prompted the Administration to suspend U.S. bilateral assistance to
Serbia (pursuant to Section 572 of the FY2004 foreign operations appropriations act) in
March 2004, and remains a significant barrier to U.S. support for Serbian efforts to
become more closely associated with Euro-Atlantic institutions. The successful conduct
of the June elections and defeat of the Radical Party candidate signaled improved
prospects for Serbian-American cooperation. Major issues on the international agenda
include Serbia’s obligations with regard to the war crimes Tribunal, the situation in
Kosovo, and Serbia’s efforts to join NATO’s Partnership for Peace program.
At the least, it appears that the worst-case scenario for bilateral U.S.-Serbian
relations has been averted. Many observers feared that multiple negative ramifications
would result from a presidential victory for Nikolic and the Radical Party. A Nikolic
victory would have most likely immediately brought down the Kostunica government and
ushered in a more unstable political environment and further fragmentation of the
democratic bloc. The ascendance of the Radical Party would likely have reduced
prospects for constructive international dialogue on Kosovo, led to more problematic
Serbian relations with Montenegro, and added additional strains in relations with the
international community, including further isolation and limits on financial assistance.
Nevertheless, it may be too early to draw definitive conclusions about the impact of
the Tadic victory until the overall political situation in Serbia becomes clearer. As noted,
Tadic’s position as currently mandated carries few governing powers. While the
presidential vote victory has boosted the Democratic Party, Tadic has stated that it will
neither join the Kostunica coalition government nor seek its fall. Where the Kostunica
government stands as a result of the vote, what the relationship will be between the Prime
Minister and President, and how cohabitation might work remain open questions. The
prospect of early general elections will likely overshadow most other issues on the policy
agenda in the near term. At the same time, Serbia’s leaders still need to meet the
conditions of the international community — especially on cooperation with the war
crimes Tribunal — for the country to move forward on closer ties with and assistance
from the United States and other western nations and institutions. Pursuing further
reforms will likely again require the consolidated support of Serbia’s democratic forces.
8 Testimony of U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Kathleen Stephens, Hearing on Serbia,
U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on International Relations, Subcommittee on Europe,
March 17, 2004.