Belgrade (AFP) – Serbia's student anti-graft protest movement ended 14 years of right-wing nationalist rule, despite not having any clearly identifiable leaders.

Issued on: 08/11/2026 - 07:43

The movement erupted in November 2024, after a concrete canopy at a newly renovated railway station in the northern city of Novi Sad collapsed, killing 16 people.

The tragedy sparked nearly two years of protests that channelled Serbians' anger over corruption and snowballed into calls for early elections.

When the polls were held, on October 25, the Student List won 140 seats in the 250-seat parliament, enough to govern alone -- a landslide political shift.

Here are the stories of some of those who took part.

'All equal'

"It was through unity, and by not putting individuals forward, that we managed to survive," Vukasin Djinovic, a student at Novi Sad's Faculty of Sciences, told AFP.

"We were all equal," he added.

It was also a strategy to avoid being targeted by pro-government media, which "constantly tried to find leaders in order to break the organisation apart," Djinovic said.

The same principle later shaped the student-backed list that won the elections. Candidates were chosen by students at faculty assemblies, most of them academics and professionals with little or no political experience.

"They were not chosen based on party membership or loyalty, but solely on their moral and professional integrity," Djinovic said.

'Nothing to blackmail us with'

Aleksa Stankovic, a Belgrade philosophy student, spent two years photographing the movement, capturing everything from meetings and marches to how police treated protesters.

"They called us terrorists, insulted us, tried to blackmail us. But they had nothing to blackmail us with. We are young, we study, we don't even have jobs yet," he said.

"We are still a critical mass that will keep a close eye on the people we elected."

'Sleep peacefully'

"After two years, I can finally feel at peace. Now I can sleep peacefully and my mum and dad can rest a little too," said Strahinja Stankovic, a political science student from Belgrade.

He helped organise the first student march to Novi Sad -- part of a campaign that saw students criss-cross the country on foot, covering hundreds of kilometres to reach areas largely under the influence of pro-government media.

In June 2025, he was arrested at a road blockade in Belgrade and spent hours handcuffed on the ground.

'Feel dignity'

For Nikola Marovic, a professor at the Faculty of Technology in Novi Sad, two years of helping students have left him "almost completely emotionally drained", but proud.

"For the first time, I truly feel dignity in having taught the students who were out on the streets," he said.

"We don't need a leader in this country. We need millions of small leaders -- and that's what we got in this movement."

© 2026 AFP

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