11 “phantom voters” registered at an abandoned house in central Belgrade — Nova.rs reports a new suspected case of election theft

A new suspected case of manipulation of voter lists in Serbia is shaking the pre-election campaign for the October 25 parliamentary elections, as the portal Nova.rs reports. At a house abandoned for at least two decades in central Belgrade, on Gundulićev venac, no fewer than 11 voters are registered.

The report comes from Goran Limić, a Belgrade resident who — according to his account to Nova.rs — noticed the case after a friend checked the lists through the voter-list verification platform. The house, built before he was born and without a construction permit, has no windows facing the yard and is completely abandoned: “there are no people, no light, nothing — only bars on the doors and windows with broken glass,” he recounts.

Limić verified the claim on the official portal of the Ministry of State Administration and Local Self-Government and on September 24 filed a complaint with the Commission for the Revision of the Voter List. “You get the complaint number and a PIN code to track it — but after more than ten days the status is still just ‘complaint received.’ Perhaps I’ll get an answer in November, when the elections are over,” he says ironically to Nova.rs, calling on citizens to check their immediate surroundings.

The case comes at a moment when tensions over the integrity of the October 25 elections are at their peak, with the opposition and monitoring organizations accusing the authorities of manipulating voter lists. Nova.rs recalls that citizens can report “phantom voters” at the local police station and to monitoring organizations such as CRTA.