Local Elections Held in Podgorica, Kotor on Sept. 29

Presidential elections in Montenegro, Podgorica, March 19 2023 (BETAPHOTO/AMIR HAMZAGIC)

Local elections took place in Podgorica and Kotor on Sept. 29, and according to election-day estimates none of the contending parties or coalitions will be able to form a government alone.

The election campaign in Podgorica was marked by barbed accusations between two hitherto associates -- Montenegrin President Jakov Milatovic, who was actively involved in the election process, and Prime Minister Milojko Spajic, but also by alliances forged by former political opponents and support from the Serbian Orthodox Church to the Europe Now Movement and Sasa Mujovic, who headed its ticket.

Prime Minister Spajic heads the Europe Now Movement. According to analysts, this is not a simple local election, but one that will affect the status of the government and parliamentary majority at the national level, especially after a recent cabinet reshuffle which brought the pro-Russian Democratic Front and the ethnic Bosniak Party, traditional allies of the Democratic Party of Socialists, into the parliament.

This is the second local election in Podgorica in two years since Milo Djukanovic's Democratic Party of Socialists lost power in the Montenegrin capital after a quarter of a century. Divisions within the largest party, the Europe Now Movement, between Prime Minister Milojko Spajic and President Jakov Milatovic, was the largest contributing factor to calling the elections. Analysts say that post-election developments are impossible to predict, but that it is safe to say that forming the government will not be easy.