Tadic: Vucic Profiting from the Fact That Politicians Are Hiding at Protests

Boris Tadic (BETAPHOTO/MILAN OBRADOVIC/DS)

Social Democratic Party leader Boris Tadic has said that the Serbia Against Violence protests are political and that it is wrong for politicians to "hide" at those rallies.

Tadic, a former Serbian president, told the Sept. 1 issue of daily Politika that incumbent President Aleksandar Vucic "has been profiting the whole time from the fact that the opposition is staying away from citizens."

Despite the opposition's earlier announcements that politicians will start speaking at the protests in early September, Together party MP Aleksandar "Cuta" Jovanovic recently said that would not be the case for another two or three weeks.

A new round of the Serbia Against Violence protests will be held in several cities and towns on Sept. 1 and 2. The rally in Belgrade has been announced for 7 p.m. on Sept. 2, and the topic will be education and the rule of law, which is why the demonstrators will march to the Ministry of Education and the Justice Ministry.

At the Krusevac Against Violence protest on Aug. 31, Belgrade Faculty of Philosophy professor, sociologist Jovo Bakic, criticized the opposition for not having stood more firmly behind the dismissed Belgrade police inspectors who had uncovered a marijuana plantation at the Jovanjica farm. He said that after that move the opposition should have sent a message to the regime that there could be "no elections" in such an atmosphere.