Local elections were held in Serbia over two rounds on 3 November and 17 November 1996, concurrently with the 1996 Vojvodina provincial election; the first day of voting also coincided with the 1996 Yugoslavian parliamentary election and the 1996 Montenegrin parliamentary election. This was the third local electoral cycle held while Serbia was a member of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the last time that Serbia oversaw local elections throughout Kosovo and Metohija until its parallel elections in 2008.
Delegates to city and municipal assemblies were elected in single-member constituencies; if no candidate secured a majority in the first round of voting, the top two candidates would face each other in a runoff vote in the second round.
Campaign and aftermath
The elections took place during the time of Slobodan Milošević's authoritarian rule as president of Serbia. In most major jurisdictions, Milošević's Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) ran in an alliance with the Yugoslav Left (JUL) and New Democracy (ND).
The main opposition grouping was the Zajedno (English: Together) alliance, which was officially formed in September 1996 by the Democratic Party (DS), the Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO), and the Civic Alliance of Serbia (GSS). The Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS) participated in the Zajedno alliance in some jurisdictions (including Kragujevac, Pančevo, Smederevo, and Čačak) and contested other areas, such as Belgrade, on its own.
The far-right Serbian Radical Party (SRS) contested the election on its own, directing its attacks on both Milošević and Zajedno.
The election results were marked by weeks of controversy. Zajedno claimed victory in several major jurisdictions, but in most instances the SPS did not accept defeat and the local election commissions (often controlled by allies of Milošević) refused to certify the opposition's wins. In Belgrade, the election commission invalidated the results in thirty-three constituencies won by Zajedno and called a third round of voting for 27 November. The Zajedno parties boycotted the third round, charging an abuse of process. These events led to the 1996–1997 protests in Serbia, in which student and opposition groups held a series of non-violent street rallies against the Milošević government.
The Milošević government held a counter-rally in Belgrade on 24 December 1996, which drew only sixty thousand attendees (many of whom had been brought in from rural areas) against three hundred thousand opposition protesters. Three days later, a delegation from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) ruled that the opposition had indeed won several of the disputed elections, including in Belgrade, Niš, Pančevo, and Zrenjanin. The Serbian government began to soften its position, accepting the opposition's victory in Niš on 8 January 1997. The Belgrade election commission announced on 17 January that Zajedno had won the elections; the government initially refused to accept this ruling, but on 13 February (following police attacks on the opposition demonstrators that were condemned internationally) the Serbian parliament approved a lex specialis that affirmed almost all of the victories claimed by Zajedno. The protests wound down after this time, and the Zajedno coalition took power in Belgrade and several other cities.
Ultimately, the parties in Zajedno were not able to remain united at the republic level, and the coalition fell apart in Belgrade before the year was over. In other jurisdictions, including Novi Sad, the parties were able to maintain their alliance until the next local election cycle in 2000.
Results
Unless otherwise noted, vote totals and percentages refer to the results in the first round of voting.
Belgrade
Elections were held at the city level and in all of Belgrade's constituent municipalities. The Zajedno alliance won a majority victory in the city, as well as winning control of most municipal assemblies. The Socialists won a smaller number of victories, mostly in the city's outer suburbs, while the Radicals won control of Zemun.
City of Belgrade
Results of the election for the City Assembly of Belgrade:
DS leader Zoran Đinđić was chosen as mayor on 21 February 1997, by a vote of sixty-eight to twenty-four among the city assembly's delegates. There were sixteen abstentions and one delegate was absent. Zajedno gained another seat shortly after the election, when DSS delegate Aleksandra Joksimović joined the DS.