Serbia
Will 2013 be better than 2012?
Jan 8th 2013, 16:47 by T.J.
2012 was the year of change in Serbia. It got a new government and a new president. 2013 will be the year that will tell whether the new leaders will deliver on their promises. According to two major opinion polls conducted in December, Serbs have high expectations of at least some of their leaders. According to one of them, 60% of Serbs think that their lives will be better than last year.
That poll, conducted by B92/Ipsos Strategic Marketing, shows that Serbs are worried by all the usual things. Thirty per cent say the greatest challenge ahead is unemployment, 17% say it is poverty and 12% low standards of living. Maybe it was the way the question was asked, but oddly, the second major poll, by Faktor Plus for Politika, found that only 18% expected their lives would be better this year while 51% said they expected no improvement.
Faktor Plus, found that the country's most popular politician was Aleksandar Vucic (pictured above), the deputy prime minister now in charge of the anti-corruption campaign. Some 24% had a positive impression of him. Tomislav Nikolic, the president, scored 21%. Dragan Djilas, the mayor Belgrade and leader of the main opposition Democratic Party (DS) came third with 17.9 % and Ivica Dacic, the prime minister, scored 9.4%.
On party support B92 found that the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) of Mr Vucic lead with 41.3% support., which is 11% more than a year ago. The DS are on 16.1%, which is 7% less than a year ago. The Socialists of Mr Dacic are on 14.9% but would get more support than the DS if you include their coalition partners.
On the question of Kosovo, Faktor Plus found that one third of Serbs thought that only autonomy for Serbs in the north could be obtained, 21% thought that the year would see a "strengthening" of Kosovo's independence (whatever that means,) and 11% believed that partition was possible. The B92 poll found that 63% of Serbs did not expect a solution to the Kosovo problem to be found this year though. With regard to the beginning of accession talks with the European Union 58% of those asked in the B92 poll thought that this was possible this year.
While the two polls do differ on various numbers they also show that Serbs enter 2013 in a rather optimistic or at least pragmatic frame of mind. High expectations are being vested in Mr Vucic above all. Yet he, and the government will need to deliver. His high ratings resemble those gained in the past by the former president, Boris Tadic, who now scores highly when people are asked whom they feel negative about.
The polls also show that, despite talk of early elections, this would clearly not be in the interests of the DS. It has not yet emerged from its post-election doldrums. Mr Djilas is very popular amongst many, but he also evokes strongly negative reactions amongst others.
In the next few months a couple of issues will determine the fate of the government and its popularity: The anti-corruption campaign, which has already seen the arrest of Miroslav Miskovic, the country's best-known tycoon, and the ongoing talks between Mr Dacic and Hashim Thaci, the prime minister of Kosovo, which are scheduled to resume on January 17th.
The economy is the government's Achilles heel. Like much of the rest of the region Serbia is facing a double-dip recession. Modest recovery of 1.6% of GDP in 2011 is expected to have been lost with a 2% contraction last year. Unemployment is at 22.4% and the economy remains highly dependent on the fortunes of the euro zone.
http://www.economist.com/blogs/easternapproaches/2013/01/serbia
