Ghost voters and the pact with Dodik. Shadows over the vote in Serbia

“I would like to thank President Trump and President Putin; their victory has shown that people like us can win elections.” “I would like to thank Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico and Milorad Dodik for being here with us. Thanks also to Vladimir Putin, who, as you well know, hopes for our people’s victory in the elections.” These two statements were made twelve days apart by Milorad Dodik, the de facto winner of the elections in Republika Srpska – the Serbian entity within Bosnia, ed. – and Aleksandar Vučić. A partnership that has lasted for more than 20 years and has ensured the political survival of the two nationalist leaders from Banja Luka and Belgrade.

An agreement that is being renewed today and which casts a disturbing shadow over next Sunday’s vote in Serbia. Indeed, the central electoral commission has officially certified that the number of voters in Serbia corresponds almost exactly to the number of inhabitants. A disturbing story, which casts doubt on the fairness of the vote on 25 October. A problem for which Dodik bears joint responsibility: indeed, alongside that figure, the Serbian Ministry of the Interior announced last week that it had issued 235,000 identity cards between May and September. This trend has not been reflected in the electoral registers, suggesting the existence of a ‘ghost’ electoral roll, comprising mostly people from Bosnia who are politically aligned with Vučić. It is no coincidence that at the rally organised by the SNS – the ruling party – there was a disproportionate number of chants in support of Republika Srpska and Ratko Mladić. Dodik was present in the stands, in the largest town closest to the Bosnian border.

“The biggest problem with the electoral process in Serbia is impunity: for all the irregularities committed over the years, we have only one conviction – that of a polling station official who added a single ballot paper,” says Ivan Đurić of CRTA, an NGO working to promote transparency in the electoral system. “There have been no convictions for electoral migration, for the systematic buying of votes or for pressure exerted on voters. The Constitutional Court has even admitted that the 2023 election was not investigated because that vote is a politically sensitive issue.” Members of CRTA have been accused by the new President of the Republic, Ana Brnabić, of campaigning for a Ukrainian-style ‘colour revolution’. They are not the only targets: over the years, this accusation has been levelled at similar NGOs and independent media outlets. Over the past month, 275 articles on CRTA have been published in the Serbian press: 85 per cent were written by media outlets close to the government and portrayed the organisation in a negative light.

“In 2023, CRTA documented ‘organised migration’ of voters, carried out through the manipulation of electoral registers.” To address the issue, the international community set up a commission to review the electoral registers and ascertain how many ghost voters and deceased persons are voting in Serbia. The publication date of the first report? 28 October, three days after the election. “The Government did not allow the Commission access to the records to carry out its work. Consequently, we do not know how many deceased people are voting or how many citizenships have been granted in a spurious manner,” states Đurić. The most common practices include issuing polling cards to deceased individuals, as well as relocating voters to the country’s most hotly contested constituencies. As a result, the opposition in Serbia does not govern a single municipality.

When asked for solutions, Đurić argues that the main thing would be to allow regulatory bodies to do their job: “The REM, the Electronic Media Commission [the Serbian AGCOM], does not monitor media impartiality closely enough,” he says. “The Republican Electoral Commission, on the other hand, is made up of one member from each party standing in the elections. To keep it happy, the Government collects signatures to allow micro-parties to stand as candidates. These lists may receive fewer than 1,000 votes, but within the Commission they have the right to vote exactly like the other parties.”

Meanwhile, Vučić is not sitting idly by: on 21 October, he stated that “whatever the outcome of the vote, I will accept it immediately after the results are published, and I will not start whingeing”. The risk, in a context of political instability and violence such as that in Serbia, is that of an extremely turbulent post-election period.