June 6, 2025.
Civic initiatives and the “Slavko Ćuruvija” Foundation today appealed to the Committee for Culture and Information of the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia with a request to stop the process of determining the final list of candidates and proposers for REM Council members, until numerous irregularities are eliminated.
The bodies of the National Assembly themselves — including the Committee for Culture and Information and the President of the National Assembly — have so far expressed suspicion of irregularities in 65 proposers and 12 candidates.
Civic initiatives and the Slavko Ćuruvija Foundation challenged 26 proposers and 14 candidates.
This means that in total, 91 proposers and 26 candidates are suspected by the Board itself, as well as by independent observers and proposers, that they do not meet the legal requirements.
In addition, the official documents of the National Assembly themselves indicate serious misinterpretations of key legal concepts, including claims:
- that persons aged 15 to 18 are not children,
- that the protection of children does not belong to the area of human rights,
- that print media portals are electronic media in the sense of the Law on Electronic Media.
Due to such serious and systemic legal problems, an additional request was submitted to the Committee for Constitutional Affairs and Legislation for an authentic interpretation of legal provisions.
At the same time, for today’s session of the Committee for Culture and Information, objections from several organizations participating in this process, which refer to the most flagrant violations of the law by individual proponents and candidates, were submitted.
In such circumstances, the adoption of the final list of candidates by the Committee for Culture and Information would represent an open violation of the law and ignoring even its own suspicions of the illegality of the proposers and candidates, which would further jeopardize the legitimacy of the entire election process for the REM Council.
Civil initiatives and the Slavko Ćuruvija Foundation demand that the Assembly of the Republic of Serbia return the procedure to legal channels and ensure that the REM Council is finally elected in accordance with the law, and not through obvious violation of legal frameworks.