Early reports suggest record high turnout in Serbia elections

Early reports suggest Serbian voters turned out in droves for its parliamentary election, as a student protest movement attempts to end the rule of the country's right-wing populist leader.

Preliminary figures provided by Serbia's election commission suggested a record high turnout, with 64.9% having cast their vote by 18:00 local time (17:00 GMT), two hours before polls were set to close.

The apparent high participation is fuelling the hopes of opposition party Student List that they can oust Aleksandar Vučić and his Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), who have been in power since 2012.

The snap elections called by Vučić follow two years of student protests triggered by the 2024 collapse of a train station canopy, which killed 16 and was seen as emblematic of corruption and negligence in Serbia.

Anti-corruption movement Student List are running on a manifesto including purging officials who broke rules cracking down on protesters, stopping party loyalists heading public enterprises, and freeing the public broadcaster of political control.

Vučić and the SNS party deny corruption and seeking to influence the media.

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Most commentators have suggested that a high final turnout, 65% or above, would favour the students.

Long queues formed outside polling stations in larger cities and smaller towns alike in Serbia, and at polling stations abroad - including Slovenia's capital Ljubljana, Munich, Los Angeles and Chicago. In Paris, Serbian voters waited in line in heavy rain.

Tensions are high across Serbia. In Belgrade, police have closed streets around the Republic Electoral Commission (RIK).

Independent watchdog CRTA reported a "large number of irregularities" and an increasing number of "violent incidents" outside polling stations. AFP news agency reported that police had not confirmed any major election-related violence.

In the street nearby, cars at the traffic lights lowered their windows to blast one of the students' anthems from loudspeakers, 'I want three kisses' - a folk song favoured because the Students' List is number three on the ballot paper. Young people on the pavement nearby started dancing.

Vučić and his SNS party are number one on the ballot paper. He has spent two terms as president and cannot seek a third term, so he is now leading his party with the aim of returning to the post of prime minister, which he left in 2017.

The 56-year-old retains strong support among a significant section of Serbia's population. They view him as a strong leader who stands up for the country's interests. He can also point to significant economic growth over the past decade and numerous improvements in infrastructure.

Vučić, who backs Serbia's candidacy for the European Union while refusing to impose sanctions on Russia over its war in Ukraine, has pledged higher pensions and public sector salaries, and investment in state healthcare.

SNS posters plastered around cities show two hands clasped together in solidarity: the hands of doctors and nurses, farmers, construction workers, teachers and parents.

"These are the hands that hold Serbia in their palms," says Vučić in his campaign video. "And with these hands, calmly and with dignity, we shall finish what we started."

That is question of this election, continuity or change.

Amid fears of electoral fraud by the SNS, the students have delegated at least two observers to each of Serbia's 8,210 voting stations.

Videos circulating on social media on Sunday morning show a cafe in the southern city of Nis, where ballot papers were allegedly filled out in advance in a practice known as 'chain voting'. Signs in the window read "private party". When they realise that they are being filmed, the papers are quickly hidden.

There have also been reports of attacks on election monitors and journalists at several polling stations.

"We are witnessing a unique experiment in European contemporary history," Žarko Korać, a former deputy prime minister and long-term opponent of nationalist parties in Serbia including the SNS, told the BBC.

Instead of running for office themselves, student-led assemblies at the country's university faculties have chosen 250 candidates to stand in the parliamentary election, with Ilija Srdanović, professor at Novi Sad University, heading the list.

The Student List of candidates for the 250-member parliament also includes doctors, actors, academics and sports personalities. Several opposition parties have opted not to run, urging their supporters to back students.

"These are people that don't know each other, you have no idea what their political beliefs are, and we now expect them to create a functioning government. So it's anybody's guess what happens after they win," Korać says.

"On the other hand, if Vučić declares victory this evening, probably late in the evening, I don't think the students will accept that."

Korać suggests that many former Vučić loyalists in high office could change sides at the last moment, if the students win. A close result, however, with both sides claiming victory, could result in weeks or months of political instability.

The electorate is 6.45 million in a population of 6.53 million, raising concerns about the reliability of the electoral register. Serbs from Kosovo, and dual Serbian citizens from neighbouring Bosnia also have the right to vote.

Katarina, 29, told the BBC she had travelled from the Netherlands back home to Serbia to vote for Student List, even though she could have cast her ballot remotely.

"I wanted to be a part of this, and I wanted to be part of a movement," she told the BBC outside a polling station in the capital's Zvezdara district.

"I think they have a chance of winning," she said, but expressed doubt about whether such a result would be respected by Vučić.

Asked whether the party's selection of candidates from different walks of life might hinder its ability to govern, she responded: "Just because they're politically inexperienced, they are experts in their own fields, which we have not seen thus far."

Additional reporting by André Rhoden-Paul

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