Academician Saicic: Vucic’s Resignation and Snap Parliamentary Election Necessary for Overcoming the Crisis 

Protests under the slogan, "We Want Elections," took place in over 30 Serbian cities on June 1.(BETAPHOTO/MILOS MISKOV)

Academician Radomir Saicic on June 3 said that overcoming the ongoing political and social crisis would required resignation of Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and scheduling a snap parliamentary election. 

In an interview with BETA, Saicic said that Vucic’s resignation would create conditions for citizens to clearly express their will and facilitate conditions for a new start, “where, in an atmosphere of cooperation, good intentions and agreement, we would continue to solve the problems faced by the Serbian society,” because “it is obvious that life is not going its normal way.” 

Commenting on a group of academicians’ request for Vucic’s resignation, Saicic said that in the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts (SANU), there were conflicting views on politics and values, with some academicians openly supporting Vucic and the ruling party, and some strongly opposing him, while a majority was keeping silent on the issue. 

He also said that Vucic was an authoritarian figure, who was deciding on many important issues in the country without respecting the constitutional powers and “even threatens to teach a lesson to the University of Belgrade. He also says he will personally take care that foreign universities are open here, but actually those are very obscure institutions that have no reputation in the world. What Vucic is planning is to ensure massive issuance of diplomas and humiliating state universities in Serbia. Such an attitude towards education has criminal elements,” the academician said. 

Saicic said that the government had started a war against educated people, because it “loves those obedient who approve of just about everything, and that is why they want to suppress educated people in all areas. This government has been deliberately and purposefully pushing all national institutions into debasement, because it considers them as enemies,” Saicic specified. 

He added that more citizens should join the students because “the students alone cannot solve the huge problems faced by Serbia. Unfortunately, the opinion of a part of uninformed citizens is significantly influenced by the pro-regime media, which have been using lies and deceptions and thereby committing a crime against the people,” the academician said.