Aleksandar Vučić

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Aleksandar Vučić
Aleksandar Vučić crop.jpg
Prime Minister of Serbia
Assumed office
27 April 2014
President Tomislav Nikolić
Deputy Ivica Dačić
Preceded by Ivica Dačić
First Deputy Prime Minister of Serbia
In office
27 July 2012 – 27 April 2014
Prime Minister Ivica Dačić
Preceded by Ivica Dačić
Succeeded by Ivica Dačić
Minister of Defence
In office
27 July 2012 – 2 September 2013
Prime Minister Ivica Dačić
Preceded by Dragan Šutanovac
Succeeded by Nebojša Rodić
Minister of Information
In office
24 March 1998 – 24 October 2000
Prime Minister Mirko Marjanović
Preceded by Radmila Milentijević
Succeeded by Ivica Dačić
Bogoljub Pejčić
Biserka Matić Spasojević
Personal details
Born (1970-03-05) 5 March 1970 (age 54)
Belgrade, Yugoslavia
(now Serbia)
Political party Radical Party (1993–2008)
Progressive Party (2008–present)
Spouse(s) Ksenija Janković (1997–2011)
Tamara Đukanović (2013–present)
Children 2
Alma mater University of Belgrade
Religion Serbian Orthodox Christianity
Signature
Website Official Website
Official Twitter

Aleksandar Vučić (Serbian Cyrillic: Александар Вучић, pronounced [aleksǎːndar ʋǔt͡ʃit͡ɕ], born 5 March 1970) is a Serbian politician who has been the Prime Minister of Serbia since 27 April 2014. He is also the leader and president of the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS). Vučić served as Minister of Information from 1998 to 2000 and later as Minister of Defence from 2012 to 2013, as well as First Deputy Prime Minister from 2012-14. He is a graduate of the Belgrade Law School.

Early life

Aleksandar Vučić was born in the family of Anđelko and Angelina (née Milovanov) in Belgrade. His paternal family hails from Čipuljići near Bugojno in central Bosnia, from whence they were expelled by the Croatian fascist Ustaše, settling near Belgrade where his father Anđelko was born.[1] Vučić's paternal grandfather Anđelko, and tens of other close relatives were killed by the Ustaše.[2] His mother was born in Bečej in Vojvodina.[1] Both of his parents were economics graduates; his father worked as an economist, his mother as a journalist.[1]

Vučić was brought up in New Belgrade,[1] and finished the Branko Radičević elementary school, and later a gymnasium in Zemun. He graduated from the Faculty of Law, University of Belgrade. He learned English in Brighton, England, and worked as a merchant in London for some time. After returning to Yugoslavia, he worked as a journalist in Pale, Bosnia and Herzegovina. There, he interviewed politician Radovan Karadžić and once played chess with general Ratko Mladić.[3] As a youngster, Vučić was a fan of the Red Star football club, often attending Red Star's matches,[3] including the one played between Dinamo Zagreb and Red Star on 13 May 1990, which turned into a huge riot.[4] The homes of his relatives were destroyed in the Croatian War.[2]

Political career

Vučić joined the Serbian Radical Party (SRS) in 1993 and was elected to the National Assembly following the 1993 parliamentary election. Two years later, at age 24, Vučić became secretary-general of the SRS. After his party won the local elections in Zemun in 1996, he became the director of Pinki Hall.[5] During his time in the SRS Vučić made many public appearances. One of them was his statement made in the Serbian National Assembly on 20 July 1995, in which he stated: "If you kill one Serb, we will kill 100 Muslims."[6][7] This happened shortly after the Srebrenica massacre by Serb forces.

In 1995, Vučić visited Knin, Croatia (then under control of the rebel Republic of Serb Krajina) with Vojislav Šešelj to protest against the Z-4 plan. Vučić ran in the Belgrade mayoral election twice, in 2004 and again in 2008, losing both times to candidates from the Democratic Party (DS).[citation needed]

Minister of Information (1998–2000)

In March 1998, Vučić was appointed Minister of Information in the government of Mirko Marjanović.[8] Following rising resentment against Milošević, Vučić introduced fines for journalists who criticized the government and banned foreign TV networks.[9] He recalled in 2014 that he was wrong and had changed, stating "I was not ashamed to confess all my political mistakes".[citation needed]

It was during Vučić's term as the Minister of Information that Slavko Ćuruvija, a prominent journalist, was murdered in a state-sponsored assassination.[10][11] In 1999, before the assassination took place, Vučić gave a front page interview to the tabloid Argument in which he stated "I will have my revenge on Slavko Ćuruvija for all the lies published in Dnevni telegraf (Ćuruvija's paper).[12] In 2014, Vučić apologized to the Ćuruvija family for having waited so long to bring the perpetrators to justice, and thanked everyone who was involved in solving the case for their work.[13]

On 23 April 1999, Vučić stated that, "Such criminals as Clinton and Blair could not have been born of any mother. Just punishment will reach them. They are the biggest criminals and beasts. By comparison, even Hitler was but a little child."[14]

Radical Party to Progressive Party

On 6 September 2008 Deputy Leader of the Radical Party and de facto leader due to absence of Vojislav Šešelj, Tomislav Nikolić resigned, because of disagreement with Šešelj over SRS support for Serbia's EU membership, and with some other well known Radical Party members formed new parliamentary club called "Napred Srbijo!" (Forward Serbia!). On 12 September 2008 Nikolić and his group were officially ejected from the Radical Party on the session of SRS leadership. Vučić, as secretary-general was called to attend this session, but he did not appear. Tomislav Nikolić announced he would form his own party and called Vučić to join. Vučić, one of the most popular figures among SRS supporters, resigned from Radical Party on 14 September 2008.[15] The next day, Vučić announced his temporary withdrawal from politics.[16]

File:Secretary of Defense Leon E. Panetta, right, escorts Serbia's Minister of Defense Aleksandar Vucic through an honor cordon and into the Pentagon on Dec 121207-D-NI589-020.jpg
Aleksandar Vučić and U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta in Washington, D.C.

On 6 October 2008 Vučić confirmed in a TV interview that he was to join the newly formed Nikolić's Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) and that he would be the Deputy President of the party. He then seemed to change his positions. In 2010 he made statements such as a "horrible crime was committed in Srebrenica", saying he felt "ashamed" of the Serbs who did it. "I do not hide that I have changed... I am proud of that," he told AFP in an interview in 2012. "I was wrong, I thought I was doing the best for my country, but I saw the results and we failed, We need to admit that."[17]

Nikolić stepped down as party leader on 24 May 2012 following his election as President of Serbia. Vučić assumed leadership until the next party congress is held to elect a new leader. On 29 September 2012 Vučić was elected as party leader, with Jorgovanka Tabaković as his deputy.[citation needed]

Minister of Defence and First Deputy Prime Minister (2012–2014)

Vučić briefly served as Minister of Defence and First Deputy Prime Minister from July 2012 to August 2013, when he stepped down from his position of Defence Minister in a cabinet reshuffle. Although the Prime Minister, Ivica Dačić, held formal power as head-of-government, many analysts thought that Vučić had the most influence in government as head of the largest party in the governing coalition and parliament.[9]

Prime Minister (2014–present)

After the 2014 Serbian parliamentary election Vučić's Serbian Progressive Party won 158 out of 250 seats in Parliament and formed a ruling coalition with the Socialist Party of Serbia. Vučić was elected Prime Minister of Serbia.[citation needed]

Invited by the Bosnian government to attend the annual Srebrenica Genocide Memorial, Vučić accepted, travelling to Srebrenica on 11 July 2015 to pay his respect. He was attacked by a mob in the crowd with stones, bottles and other objects and had to flee the premise. Members of the crows shouted "Allāhu Akbar" and "Die, Chetnik".[18] Social media has called him a "genocide denier".[19]

Policies

Anti-corruption and organized crime

Vučić has pledged to tackle corruption and organized crime in Serbia.[20][not in citation given] He also vowed to investigate controversial privatizations and ties between tycoons and former government members.[9][21] Vučić’s anti-corruption drive has recorded a 71 per cent personal approval rating in a March 2013 opinion poll,[20] though in more than two years it produced no convictions and only a handful of arrests.

EU membership and Kosovo

Vučić has been central to negotiations on Serbia’s bid for EU accession, traveling to Brussels for talks with the EU’s Foreign Affairs Commissioner, Baroness Ashton, as well as to North Kosovska Mitrovica to discuss the details of a political settlement between Belgrade and Pristina.[22][23] During his visit to northern Kosovo, to garner support for the Brussels-brokered deal, he urged Kosovo Serbs to “leave the past and think about the future”.[21]

Relations with Croatia

In 2007 Vučić made inflammatory[citation needed] remarks about the Democratic League of Croats in Vojvodina, calling it a branch of the Croatian Democratic Union.[24] In 2008, with the establishment of the Serbian Progressive Party, Vučić said that the goal of a Greater Serbia taking Croatian territory up to the proposed Virovitica-Karlovac-Karlobag line "is unrealistic and silly".[25] In December 2008 Vučić announced that he would make a visit to Croatian Serbs, causing a controversy.[citation needed] The Croatian newspaper Jutarnji claimed in a reportage that none of his family members had been killed during World War II, upon which he replied that these were "brutal lies and attacks on his family".[2]

Ratko Mladić

Before splitting away from the Radical Party of Vojislav Šešelj, Aleksandar Vučić was openly and publicly celebrating and calling for the protection of Ratko Mladić, a military leader accused of committing war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. In 2007, while Mladić was still at large in Serbia, Vučić was distributing posters stating "Safe house for general Mladić". During a parliament session he stated that the Serbian Parliament will always protect and be a safe house for the general and that any house in Serbia that bears the last name of Vučić will protect and shelter Mladić.[26]

In the same year Vučić organized a street protest where the signs naming the street after the assassinated pro-west Serbian PM were replaced with the signs effectively renaming the street to Ratko Mladić Boulevard.[26] This has become an annual event in which Serbian ultra-right factions place the same signs on top of the regular signs to celebrate the anniversary of the Zoran Đinđić assassination.[citation needed]

Accusations of media manipulation and censorship

In July 2014, journalists associations were concerned about the freedom of the media in Serbia, in which Vučić came under criticism.[27][28] The German newspaper Die Tageszeitung reported that the media in Serbia are censored and Vučić is responsible for that. Serbian journalist Jovana Gligorijević also expressed her concerns and said that „the freedom of speech was indeed threatened because internet pages were blocked, blogs removed and bloggers arrested" for which Gligorijević indirectly blamed Vučić.[27][28]

The situation was exacerbated when the commissioner for media freedom of the OSCE, Dunja Mijatović, wrote Vučić and made attention with the suppression of the media. Vučić said that the international community, foreign ambassadors and the OSCE would lead a campaign against him, because Serbia does not want to impose sanctions against Russia because of Ukraine crisis, and that the suppression of the media are nonsense. He also claimed that he had never heard of these portals, which were blocked and demanded an apology from the OSCE. Paula Tide, the Vice President of the OSCE in Serbia, rejected the apology. The head of the European Union Delegation to the Republic of Serbia in Belgrade, Ambassador Michael Davenport, and the US Ambassador Michael Kirby shared Tide's opinion.[27][28]

Personal life

On 27 July 1997 Vučić married Ksenija Janković, a journalist at Radio Index and Srpska reč. The couple has two children. The marriage ended with divorce in 2011. On 14 December 2013, Vučić married Tamara Đukanović, a diplomat at the Serbian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.[29]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Poreklo.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Isailović 6 September 2010.
  4. ↑ Index.hr 13 May 2015.
  5. ↑ Aleksandar Vučić Istinomer.rs
  6. ↑ "VIDEO/Ovako je Vučić govorio 1995. godine: Ubijte jednog Srbina, mi ćemo stotinu muslimana!", 24sata.info; accessed 9 December 2015.
  7. ↑ "Forgetting resistance in the Balkans" balkanist.net; accessed 9 December 2015.
  8. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  10. ↑ Slavko Ćuruvija
  11. ↑ https://www.cpj.org/killed/1999/slavko-curuvija.php
  12. ↑ Ексклузивно На Монитору: „Убица“ Славка Ћурувије Је „Проговорио“… , wordpress.com; accessed 9 December 2015.
  13. ↑ "Milorad Ulemek provided info about murder of Slavko Ćuruvija", InSerbiaNews.info; accessed 9 December 2015.
  14. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  15. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.[dead link]
  16. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.[dead link]
  17. ↑ Aleksandar Vucic: from nationalist hawk to devout Europeanist, GlobalPost.com, 13 March 2014.
  18. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  19. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  20. ↑ 20.0 20.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  21. ↑ 21.0 21.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  22. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  23. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  24. ↑ Šešeljevac vodi Skupštinu, a Vuk Drašković Vijeće Europe, Jutarnji List
  25. ↑ Vučić sad nije za veliku Srbiju
  26. ↑ 26.0 26.1 Press Online :: Politika :: Vučić lepio plakate sa natpisom Bulevar Ratka Mladića
  27. ↑ 27.0 27.1 27.2 Die Tageszeitung:Die Pampigkeit des Herrn Vučić - In Serbien werden Internetseiten attackiert, Blogs gesperrt und Blogger festgenommen. Die Betroffenen berichteten wohl zu kritisch über die Regierung (German) - The stroppiness of Mr. Vučić - In Serbia being attacked websites, blocked blogs and arrested bloggers. The victims reported probably too critical about the government
  28. ↑ 28.0 28.1 28.2 Die Tageszeitung:"Serbische Regierung zensiert Medien - Ein Virus namens Zensur", taz.de; accessed 9 December 2015.(German)
  29. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

Sources

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Other sources

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External links

Political offices
Preceded by Minister of Information
1998–2000		 Succeeded by
Ivica Dačić
Bogoljub Pejčić
Biserka Matić Spasojević
Preceded by Minister of Defence
2012–2013		 Succeeded by
Nebojša Rodić
Preceded by First Deputy Prime Minister of Serbia
2012–2014		 Succeeded by
Ivica Dačić
Prime Minister of Serbia
2014–present		 Incumbent
Party political offices
Preceded by Leader of the Serbian Progressive Party
2012–present		 Incumbent
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