Early morning on 26 October, it issix o’clock and, while it is raining, I return home after twenty-eight sleepless hours. The streets are empty, there is only one woman standing at the bus stop. We do not now each other. She looks at me, I look back and tears start to flow down of our cheeks. I continue to walk home, tired and sluggish. But I walk freely and finally breathe.

The Student List secured a landslide victory in the snap parliamentary elections on 25 October in Serbia. Together with tens of thousands of citizens, on election day, I made a small contribution to the large infantry that students gathered, trained and motivated. It is an infantry without ranks and uniforms, made up of people of different generations, professions and life stories, but united by the firm belief that it is worth joining the struggle started and led by students and that it is important to save every vote expressed in the elections.

I am proud to say that I was just one of many who believed that change would not happen by itself and that it would not be enough to support students, write comments on social networks, share student messages and rejoice in their courage. Many accepted their share of responsibility in the change that brought us freedom. And on that day, at polling stations across Serbia, in mobile election monitoring teams, on the streets, in lines in front of polling stations, exactly that happened: thousands of people decided on their own future, convinced that they had reason to hope.

I watched people who worked for hours without rest and prevented electoral fraud and malfeasance. I saw exhaustion vanish in the face of the conviction that we must not miss any detail, I saw the nervousness that turned into determination, unknown people who became each other’s support. And all the time I was aware of how much work, patience, knowledge and trust was needed so that the enormous energy that was initiated and preserved by the student movement would be crowned on election day.

2026 is different from 2000

I remember a lot. I remember the elections on 24 September 2000, the days that followed and 5 October, when we believed that Serbia had finally come to terms with its past. I remember that we were convinced that better times were coming, just as I remember how quickly we forgot the darkness from which we had emerged.

Twenty-six years later, I do not fall into the trap of making comparisons. It may seem like déjà vu, but everything is new and different, I would say much more positive. I witnessed how something much bigger was created around the student movement, as a centripetal force, than the rejection of one authority, how a tightly connected network of people was born, ready to take responsibility, to organise, to learn from each other, to share knowledge and experience and to unite in order to reach a goal too big for an individual or a small group of people.

Read also: Serbia, the dramatic “behind the scenes” of election night

Again, I was especially inspired by not only the size, but the breadth of the student movement. Those who until yesterday seemed disillusioned, apathetic, abstinent, uninterested, revolted, passive, hopeless, those who thought they could not change anything and those who believed they knew everything about politics, came under the same umbrella of the student movement, leaving aside ideological differences, high politics and issues that have long been imposed as the only ones that mattered to the society.

Thus, suddenly, seemingly secondary issues, such as the situation in schools and kindergartens, parks, the environment and other long-ignored issues, united the citizens of Serbia even more, with a clear awareness that the number one enemy is omnipresent crime and corruption. The student movement has penetrated deeply into the everyday life of all of us, encouraging us to become active and make decisions about our own lives.

Queues for voting, people traveling thousands of kilometers to vote, mobile teams of controllers standing in front of each polling station to protect each vote, preventing theft and uncovering all the frauds the regime used even on election day, the feeling that it was a matter of life or death – these are the images I convey to you from the polling station.

Protecting the ballot box

I also convey that at 6:00 p.m. we received information that Ćaciland was filling up with people and that the Gendarmerie started deploying in the immediate vicinity of my polling station. They informed us that there might be attempts to break the ballot boxes in the last two hours of the election, and we received the directive “GUARD THE BOX”. And none of us thought about the risks to our own safety. We surrounded the ballot box and guarded it with our bodies. I defended it as if I were defending my own son’s life.

The closing of the polling station. Fifteen hours of full concentration. Counting of votes. The students won convincingly. We knew it, it was clear to everyone, it was palpable weeks before the election. We were, however, still worried. We knew who we were dealing with. It was a warm evening and the windows were open.

Read also: “I am infinitely grateful to my students.” Mirjana Nikolić and the new Serbia

Belgrade, Serbia, 25 October 2026 – Photo D. Nenadić

At 21:30, cries of freedom echoed through my city. We heard car horns, people singing and shouting “victory, victory”. However, we did not celebrate. Besides us in the electoral committee there were also those who mourned the defeat, and we, above all, tried to remain dignified. I could barely contain both my smile and my tears, I could not contact any of my relatives to share the joy of the final collapse of the regime that destroyed this country. I recognised those who thought the same way I did at the polling board and only after we finished all the formalities, we hugged for a long time, as if we were a family.

Another six hours of waiting to hand over the bag with election materials and ballots, together with representatives of 122 more polling stations of the second largest municipality in Serbia, to the local election commission. Time passed with songs and congratulations, cramps in the legs and stomach. My husband also came from Slavija, where the citizens were already celebrating, he kept me company and we were excited for the first peaceful night in which we knew that he would not be arrested after the tabloid Informer released a recording of the conversation from the bar where the secret service illegally recorded it, and that our minor child, whom we had taken to safety, would be able to return home.

Let us remember this, because it should not be an election day show. A scenario where going to the polls is a matter of life and death, where the lives and livelihoods of thousands of people depend on the results of the elections, should never be repeated again. Let us be aware that, if the results had been different, today the prisons in Serbia would be full of those who dared to support the students. Let us remember what Serbia was like until 25 October, so that it never happens again.

It is six o’clock in the morning, 26 October has finally arrived. An unknown woman at the bus stop. We did not exchange a word. I do not know anything about her, except that we looked at each other and cried. Everything that happened in Serbia during the last two years and that cannot be summed up in short reports, measured in percentages or explained by political analysis, fits into that short meeting. Recognition. Relief. The feeling that we understand how important, crucial and decisive this vote was for us.

I am heading home. Light and calm. We have a lot of work ahead of us.