Dozens of schools in Serbia did not start the announced new term on Monday, as teachers went on strike in support of ongoing student protests – but also in protest against a deal that some unions made with the government.
Media reports said dozens of schools in many towns and cities held no classes, and that teachers or students held protests in Nis, Kragujevac, Novi Sad, Zrenjanin and other places.
Claims about the success of the strike differ.
Prime Minister Milos Vucevic claimed classes on Monday went ahead in “over 80 per cent of schools”.
Teachers protest in Belgrade, January 20 2025. Photo: BIRN/Katarina Baletic.
However, the president of the Independent Union of Educational Workers, Dusan Kokot, said the school term did not start in over 50 per cent of schools.
In some schools, teachers went on strike while in others, amid claims that teachers were being pressured to hold the classes, parents did not send their children to school. In front of some schools, parents staged protests in support of teachers.
Teachers in Belgrade held a mass rally in the city centre, supported by pupils, students and other citizens calling on the authorities to stop targeting them and again expressing support for student demands.
Students are demanding official accountability for 15 deaths caused by an infrastructure collapse at Novi Sad railway station in November and an end to the prosecutions of people arrested at previous protests.
Teachers protest in Belgrade, January 20 2025. Photo: BIRN/Katarina Baletic.
Zoran Basic, Professor at the Belgrade Thirteenth Gymnasium, told BIRN that his school “is not working today and all the teachers are protesting, together with the students”, he added.
“The main reason we are here is to show that the strike is not over, and the unions have betrayed us. At any cost, we want to persevere in our fight for dignity and to support students,” he said.
Milorad Dasic, a professor at Belgrade’s Ninth Gymnasium ‘Mihailo Petrovic Alas’, told BIRN that he came to the protest with his colleagues to criticise the government’s “arrogant” way of communicating with teachers.
“This is what deeply offends us, and me as a human being, first of all [the communications of] the prime minister – a kind of arrogance and disrespect, first of all of our profession and an underestimation of children, students and their attitudes,” he said.
Serbian media reported on January 15 that Prime Minister Milos Vucevic had ordered that “the second semester begins on January 20, period!”
On Monday, Vucevic warned of likely penalties. “From tomorrow, the educational inspectorate will go to all those schools that, contrary to the law, have suspended classes,” he said.
Unions and the government continued negotiations about teachers’ demands during the winter break, after the government abruptly ended the school term prematurely on December 23 amid the ongoing protests.
Students have been blockading university buildings in Serbia for almost two months after an attack on protesters in front of the Belgrade Faculty of Dramatic Arts on November 22.
Commemorative silent protests lasting 15 minutes have also been held regularly in Belgrade, Novi Sad and other towns across Serbia ever since the railway station disaster.
Lawyers and actors also halt work
Teachers protest in Belgrade, January 20 2025. Photo: BIRN/Katarina Baletic.
The protests have spread from students and teachers to other sectors. The Serbian Bar Association on Saturday announced a seven-day suspension of work in support of the students’ protests.
“These are exceptional situations, when the Bar Association, very rarely, makes such a decision – but the situation in society is such that it demands such a reaction,” said lawyer Vladimir Beljanski.
“Work will only be conducted in cases where there are deadlines that, if missed, would cause irreparable damage to our clients,” he explained.
However, Belgrade Higher Court ruled on Monday that lawyers are not allowed to stage a total stoppage.
Last week, all theatres in Belgrade and Novi Sad cancelled plays scheduled for Thursday and Friday.
Famous Yugoslav and Serbian actress Svetlana Bojkovic and other staff at the Atelje 212 theatre in Belgrade are inform the audience that Friday’s play is cancelled in solidarity with the student protests but also against the targeting of actors who are supporting them. Photo: BIRN/Katarina Baletic.
The cancellations came after one student was injured when a man drove at high speed into a crowd of student protesters in Belgrade. This was the most serious in a series of attacks on students and members of the public who have been protesting each day and blocking roads in memory of the victims of the Novi Sad station disaster.
Many actors have shown support by displaying red-painted hands at the end of their plays, as a symbol of one of the key slogans of the protesters, “Your hands are bloody”. The slogan is a reference to those alleged to be responsible for the 15 deaths at Novi Sad station.
Workers at the state energy company, Elektroprivreda Srbije, EPS, have also announced that they will support students and organise protests. Dragoslav Ljubicic, from the Nezavisnost [Independence] union, said they would protest on Thursday in front of the EPS building in Belgrade.
Students and members of the public at a protest rally in Belgrade, January 19 2025. Photo: EPA-EFE/ANDREJ CUKIC.
The collapse at Novi Sad train station happened after major renovation works, which began in 2021 as part of a Chinese-led upgrade of Serbia’s railway infrastructure.
The works were unveiled in 2022 during that year’s election campaign but the reconstruction then continued until July 2024, when the local authorities declared the station had been rebuilt “according to European standards”.
Thirteen people, including the country’s construction minister at the time, have been charged with endangering public safety over the collapse.
