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RR RUEHAG RUEHAST RUEHDA RUEHDF RUEHFL RUEHIK RUEHKW RUEHLA RUEHLN
RUEHLZ RUEHPOD RUEHROV RUEHSR RUEHVK RUEHYG
DE RUEHBW #0077/01 0181820
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 181820Z JAN 08
FM AMEMBASSY BELGRADE
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 2079
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 BELGRADE 000077 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PREL SR
SUBJECT: SERBIA'S PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS: TOO CLOSE TO CALL 
 
REF: A) BELGRADE 50, B) BELGRADE 22 
 
Summary 
------- 
 
¶1.  (SBU) Democratic Party candidate for reelection, President Boris 
Tadic, faces stiff competition from Radical contender Tomislav 
Nikolic in Serbia's January 20 presidential elections, and Tadic is 
losing ground.  Nikolic's slick campaign reinvented the candidate as 
a kind, trustworthy grandfather, while Tadic's lackluster 
performances have failed to overcome an apathetic electorate's 
disappointment with his leadership and Serbian politics in general. 
Spin doctors have collapsed the differences in the Democratic and 
Radical Party platforms, and the deciding issue will be voters' 
perceptions about the economy.  Tadic and Nikolic will emerge from 
the field of nine going into the January 20 first round, with 
Nikolic ahead, and the two will run neck-and-neck in a February 
run-off.  Sprinting toward round two, Tadic must pick up the pace 
and a lot of votes.  He will need to change either his image or 
Nikolic's, or both, to win.  End Summary. 
 
Polling Data: A Race for Third Place 
------------------------------------ 
 
¶2.  (U) Serbia's pollsters and gambling establishments all show 
Nikolic beating Tadic in the first round.  Polls vary, but 
consistently put the leads within four points of each other.  Gallup 
International's polling data released January 15 show Tadic trailing 
Nikolic 34.6% to 38.7%; and the daily journal Presse puts Nikolic at 
36.1% to Tadic's 33.2% (source of data unknown).  The International 
Republican Institute's tracking poll (data as of January 15) has 
Nikolic with 29%, to Tadic's 27%.  Polls and media variously place 
Socialist Party candidate Milutin Mrkonjic, Liberal Democrat Cedomir 
(Ceda) Jovanovic, and New Serbia's Velimir Ilic in third place, with 
all three parties dividing about 23% of the vote. 
 
Nikolic: What You See Is NOT What You Get 
----------------------------------------- 
 
¶3.  (U) What Serbian viewers see on the television ads and stumping 
around the country is a kindly, elderly Nikolic, walking 
hand-in-hand with his young grandson toward Serbia's soft-focus 
future.  A calm, articulate Nikolic muses in on-camera interviews 
about job-creation and economic growth.  In the run-up to the 
election, he even confusingly stole Tadic's plank and maintained 
support for Serbia's entry into the European Union. 
 
¶4.  (U) Nikolic's make-over has altered his style, delivery, and 
platform.  What you no longer see is the spokesman of the xenophobic 
ultra-nationalist Radical Party.  What you do not see (because no 
station would carry it) is a Vojvodina Social Democratic League's TV 
spot that links Nikolic to some of SRS Party and spiritual leader 
Vojislav Seselj's most notorious acts, with footage of police aiming 
firearms at demonstrating students and soldiers marching against 
Kosovo.  What you do not hear (that you did hear during Nikolic's 
2004 run for president) are calls for the expulsion of all ethnic 
Albanians from Kosovo and for joining the Krajina (Croatia) and 
Republika Srpska to Serbia.  Gone is the dry speaker of the 2004 
campaign, whose range was monotonous and matter-of-fact even when 
delivering chilling messages.  During this campaign, unlike the 
last, Nikolic has refrained from openly expressing his dislike of 
Croats and journalists.  While he still opposes cooperation with the 
Hague Tribunal, he has not (as he did in 2003) called those who 
disagreed with him "unpatriotic."  He continues to oppose Kosovo 
independence (as do all candidates running except Cedomir 
Jovanovic), but he publicly stated that he would not go to war over 
Kosovo. 
 
¶5.  (U) The made-over Nikolic appeals to a broad spectrum of Serbian 
society.  Political analyst and former journalist Dragan Stojkovic 
divides Nikolic supporters into three demographics: 
 
- older voters, many of whom fell through the cracks in Serbia's 
political/economic transition and who nostalgically identify in 
Nikolic "real Serbian values" and hope he will restore the Serbia of 
their youth; (It is noteworthy that in a June 2007 poll, 56% of 
respondents across all age groups described societal conditions, in 
general, as "hardly bearable" or "unbearable.") 
 
- middle-aged voters with young families, who believe the Radical 
promises of a better standard of living and who are frustrated with 
Tadic's failure to tackle corruption; and 
 
- the "turbo-folk," sanctions generation, raised on the image of 
murdered paramilitary leader Arkan as a Serbian Che Gueverra, and a 
diet of conspiracy theories, who want Serbia to be tough and life to 
be easy.  (Note: turbo folk describes a popular, vaguely folkloric 
music characterized often by vulgar lyrics, a disco beat, and 
performed with a chorus line of dancers/cheerleaders.) 
 
¶6.  (U) A glance at popular blogs suggest that Nikolic's young 
supporters are not fooled by their candidate's kinder, softer image 
 
BELGRADE 00000077  002 OF 004 
 
 
and look to him to keep Serbia safe from the West.  The Serbian 
Radical Forum, a Radical internet blog, discourages "non-believers" 
from logging on.  If an internet user who previously logged into the 
forum of B92 (a news media outlet) tries to access the Serbian 
Radical Forum a pop-up displays a swastika and a message appears 
that says, "You are a fascist Serbian hater coming from B-92.  **** 
off to the place you come from." 
 
Tadic: Disappointed Democrats 
----------------------------- 
 
¶7.  (U) Tadic supporters lack the Radicals' fervor -- for better and 
for worse.  Democrats historically manifest their apathy and/or 
confidence in their low voter turnout.  While pollsters estimate 
that potential Tadic supporters out-number Radicals more than 3 to 
2, the Radicals are historically far better at turning out the vote. 
 In the 2004 presidential elections, for example, Nikolic won 1.4 
million votes, or over 90% of the Radicals' known universe.  The 
Democrats, in contrast, turned out approximately 1.7 million, or 
about 70% of their upper limit.  The Democratic Party campaign has 
so far failed to overcome voter apathy. 
 
Voter Apathy 
------------ 
 
¶8.  (U) On a visit to Novi Sad in multi-ethnic Vojvodina on January 
17, poloff spoke with young people around the city regarding their 
plans for election day.  Their frustration was telling.  A marketing 
student visiting the American Corner said he believed Serbia would 
have no future until the country resolved Kosovo status and forged 
stronger ties with the United States, which he hoped to visit some 
day.  The student said that no current politician was able to 
accomplish these goals, and he would, therefore, stay home from the 
polls.  Another young man, working at a bookstore in the city's 
pedestrian zone said he realized that Serbia faced many issues vital 
to the country's future, but he did not see who would resolve those 
problems.  Another young man, attending a discussion on hate speech 
at the Independent Journalist's Association, said he would vote for 
Tadic, but most of his friends were disappointed by Tadic and did 
not know how they could change their own future.  They did not want 
the status quo, and they did not want Nikolic, so they would stay 
home on election day. 
 
Campaigning on Europe 
--------------------- 
 
¶9.  (U) Tadic is running on Serbia's European future and credits his 
leadership for getting the country close to membership in the 
European Union.  IRI Focus groups rank Tadic high on maintaining 
peace and stability, improving Serbia's position in Europe, and 
increasing investment and these indicators have clearly infomed 
Tadic's speech writers.  But the message is unclear.  Nenad Canak, 
President of the League of Vojvodina Social Democrats, told poloff 
on January 17 that Tadic would have difficulty attracting young, 
educated, urban voters in the first round.  Such voters were likely 
to stay home from the polls, because they did not agree with 
Nikolic's ideals, but Tadic did not present any real alternative. 
Many of these individuals had voted for Tadic before and did not see 
real improvement in conditions in Serbia.  His campaign platform 
consisted of a "foggy story about the EU and a completely not 
understandable story about NATO."  Voters were not certain what EU 
integration meant, and there was no popular support for NATO, due to 
lingering memories of the 1999 bombing campaign against Milosevic. 
 
 
Prospect of Prosperity; 
It's the Economy, ... 
---------------------- 
 
¶10.  (U) Although Serbia's President has no direct authority over 
Serbia's economy, economic concerns weigh heavily on the electorate, 
and IRI's December focus groups identified the economy as the 
deciding issue in the campaign.  Throughout the campaign, newspaper 
headlines featured stories about corruption, tycoons, privatization 
of Serbia's energy assets and airline to Russia, and rising 
inflation. 
 
¶11.  (U) While Tadic might rightly claim that his image and 
leadership inspires Europe's and investors' confidence, his campaign 
has failed to deliver this message.  (Avoiding negative campaigning, 
Tadic has not mentioned that the stock market dropped about 30% 
following Nikolic's election to Parliament Speaker in the summer of 
2007, for example.)  Instead, suffering an incumbent's disadvantage, 
focus groups hold Tadic responsible for Serbia not having recovered 
Yugoslavia's pre-breakup status quo ante and its leadership in the 
Balkans.  The common refrain emboffs hear from random, albeit 
anecdotal, questioning of taxi drivers, shop keepers, and the 
man-on-the-street is that they lived better under Tito and 
Milosevic.  Pollsters tell us that focus groups give Tadic middling 
or poor marks in response to questions on honesty and corruption and 
random man-on-the-street interlocutors' most common refrain is that 
Tadic allowed the "tycoons" to rob Serbia. 
 
BELGRADE 00000077  003 OF 004 
 
 
 
Reaching the Undecided...In the Style of ???? 
--------------------------------------------- 
 
¶12.  (U) Tadic's campaign and especially his television spots depict 
the President energetically rallying crowds from behind a podium on 
a bare stage.  Observers have described the arm-waving, triumphant 
image as reminiscent of Mussolini.  On the plus side, Tadic's 
handlers show signs of tackling the apathetic faithful and even of 
expanding Tadic's base.  In Belgrade, the evening of January 18, 
during Tadic's final rally before the campaign blackout, Republika 
Srpska Prime Minister Milorad Dodik took the stage to endorse Tadic. 
 Dodik's message, a DS member of parliament suggested, reached out 
to the undecided and aimed to discourage the community of Serb 
displaced from Croatia and from Bosnia and Herzegovina in the 1990s 
from voting for "the Radicals that helped put them in the 
unfortunate position" of refugees. 
 
Reaching the Other Democrats 
---------------------------- 
 
¶13.  (SBU) Two smaller democratic parties have already given Tadic 
the nod.  At the January 12 Sandzak Democratic Party (SDP) 
conference, a coalition partner, SDP party leader and government 
minister Rasim Ljajic gave his strong support to Tadic.  SDP is a 
regional party popular among predominantly Bosnian voters.  SDP has 
publicly claimed that it generated 50,000 votes in the January 2007 
elections, though others believe 30,000-35,000 may be more accurate. 
 Tadic spoke to the 1,000 attendees, stressing his commitment to all 
ethnic groups in Serbia.  Nenad Canak, leader of the League of 
Vojvodina Social Democrats also endorsed Tadic for the first time at 
the SDP conference.  Canak later told a smaller group that had leant 
party support to Tadic having recognized that the election would be 
so tight race.  With DS and SRS polling 37% in one poll, Tadic said, 
"We are at our strongest, but so are they," he said. 
 
Hungarian Leader to Support Tadic in Round 2 
-------------------------------------------- 
 
¶14.  (SBU) Istvan Pasztor, head of the Alliance of Vojvodina 
Hungarians, an LDP coalition partner in Vojvodina, at his Belgrade 
rally on January 14 told poloff that his campaign was going well. 
He said that his candidacy united the various Hungarian parties and 
provided an opportunity to publicize the concerns of minorities in 
Serbia.  Pasztor's campaign is for Euro-Atlantic integration, 
cooperation with the Hague Tribunal, and Kosovo independence.  His 
platform also addresses the concerns of minorities and the need for 
increased autonomy of Vojvodina and a more decentralized state. 
Pasztor said he would be very satisfied to win 80,000 votes.  He 
said that in the second round he would support whichever democratic 
candidate accepted his platform, most likely Democratic Party 
candidate, Serbian president Boris Tadic. 
 
Ceda: Different from all the Rest 
--------------------------------- 
 
¶15.  (U) LDP's final campaign rally in Belgrade on January 14 
attracted 5,000 mostly young people.  Most prominent leaders of LDP 
and its parliamentary coalition leaders were present, as were 
personalities popular with the young, including dramatist Biljana 
Srbljanovic, movie director Milutin Petrovic, and Vladimir Beba 
Popovic, a former confidant of Djindjic.  Ceda has run in opposition 
to Tadic, maintaining that the president has accomplished little to 
bring into Europe and criticizing Tadic for acquiescing to 
Kostunica.  Demonstrating his acceptance of Kosovo independence, 
Ceda rallied the Belgrade crowd by paraphrasing President Kennedy's 
Berlin speech.  "I'm a citizen of Pristina, I'm an Albanian," he 
said. 
 
Other Election News: 
U.S. and UK Denied Observer Status 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶16.  (U) The Republican Election Commission (RIK) continues to flout 
the rule of law by refusing on January 11 to issue election observer 
credentials to U.S. and UK embassy personnel.  On January 16, 
Serbia's Speaker of Parliament, Oliver Dulic, sent both embassies 
personal letters endorsing the Supreme Court decision and 
apologizing for the RIK decision.  (Text follows.)  However, on 
January 18 the RIK once again voted (14-10) against accreditation. 
The vote was along party lines with the SRS, SPS, DSS, and Reformist 
party opposing accreditation and the DS, LDP and G17 for U.S. and UK 
credentialing.  (Post intends to send out reporting teams throughout 
Serbia to cover the first round of the elections, but will observe 
rules governing approaching polling stations.) 
 
Text of Letter Dated January 16, 2008, from Parliament Speaker 
Oliver Dulic to Ambassador. 
--------------------------------------------- --------- 
 
¶17.  (U) /Begin Text/ 
 
 
BELGRADE 00000077  004 OF 004 
 
 
Your Excellency, 
 
I am witting to inform you that the Supreme Court of Serbia has made 
a ruling which annulled the formal Decision of the Republic 
Electoral Commission according to which the Embassy of the United 
Kingdom and the Embassy of the United States of America have not 
been granted with the permission to observe the elections for the 
President of Serbia. 
 
I hereby express my sincere apology for the decision made by the 
Republic Electoral Commission which could have had manifold harmful 
consequences. 
 
I would also like you to note that pursuant to my legal powers I 
have invited all international organizations to take part in the 
process of observation of the forthcoming presidential elections in 
accordance with the democratic principles and values. 
 
The Decision of the Supreme Court which was issued today, provided 
representatives of all Embassies and International Organizations 
with the possibility to observe the elections, and thus, confirmed 
our democratic commitment and removed the likelihood of encountering 
possible negative consequences of the previous decision. 
 
Yours Sincerely, 
 
/S/ 
 
Dr. Oiver Dulic 
Speaker of the National Assembly 
 
/End Text/ 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶19.  (SBU) The real race begins on January 21.  Tadic entering this 
last sprint as an underdog may finally shake off voter apathy and 
get democrats to the polls.  We understand that Tadic's campaign may 
take a turn and, without focusing on the bad, old past of Milosevic, 
will suggest the different futures that might result from Serbia's 
choice for president.  Assuming for the sake of argument that many 
Socialists and New Serbia voters would support Nikolic over Tadic, 
the president will win only with support of democrats (liberal, or 
others) from outside his base, and, rightly or wrongly, the 
president is convinced he needs the support of Prime Minister 
Kostunica's Democratic Party of Serbia.  We expect that he will get 
it, in the end, but at a price; continued slavery to the whims of 
Kostunica.  End Comment. 
MUNTER