Serbia Gets New Parliament, Paving Way for New Cabinet
Serbia swore in a new parliament on Wednesday following early elections in March designed to boost the Balkan country's bid to win EU membership.
A former nationalist fire-brand turned devoted pro-European, Aleksandar Vucic, is expected to be named prime minister when a cabinet is chosen later this month.
His Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) won a resounding victory in the election, taking 158 seats in the 250-seat parliament.
It had vowed to push through tough reforms aimed at meeting EU requirements and breathing new life in the struggling Serbian economy.
Outgoing prime minister Ivica Dacic's Socialist Party, which has been in a coalition with the SNS, won 44 seats in the new parliament and Vucic is expected to ask them to join his cabinet.
Only seven parties, including three representing ethnic minorities, have made it into the new parliament.
The center-left Democratic Party, which held power from 2008 to 2012, won only 19 seats.
Vucic has built up huge support on the back of a tough anti-corruption drive and his efforts to mend relations with Brussels.
A compromise deal last year over the status of breakaway Kosovo opened the door for Serbia to start accession talks with the EU, which it hopes to join in 2020.
The future cabinet will have to focus on further steps in normalizing relations with Pristina, a key condition for its membership hopes.
But the economy has become the top priority for the government, with more than 20 percent of Serbia's 7.2 million people unemployed -- and those in work struggling to survive on an average monthly salary of 350 euros ($480).
Serbia's eight billion euro ($11 billion) budget is struggling to cope with 1.7 million pensioners and a bloated public sector that employs more than 700,000 people.
The new government will also have to push through a stringent austerity package approved by parliament last year, including the privatization of more than 170 state-owned companies, along with subsidy cuts and tax increases.
