Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić has resigned from office, triggering early presidential elections and clearing the way for him to contest October's snap parliamentary vote as a candidate for prime minister. Vučić, who has dominated Serbian politics for more than a decade — first as prime minister from 2014 and then as president since 2017 — is constitutionally barred from seeking a third presidential term. Reading his resignation statement at the presidential building in Belgrade, he announced he would lead his right-wing Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) in the parliamentary ballot set for 25 October.

The resignation comes after nearly two years of mounting public unrest rooted in the collapse of a concrete canopy at the Novi Sad railway station in November 2024, which killed 16 people. Novi Sad is Serbia's second-largest city, located in the north of the country. Protesters — initially university students, later joined by teachers, workers and farmers — blamed the disaster on systemic corruption and governmental negligence, given that Vučić had personally associated himself with the station's renovation as a symbol of national progress. The movement, which blocked universities and staged demonstrations across the country, has since formalised itself into a political platform called Students Win, registering as an electoral list and emerging as a leading challenger to SNS rule. Analysts describe the election as having a referendum-like atmosphere, with Students Win polling closely against the ruling party. Also running are a pro-EU opposition coalition called European Serbia and several smaller groups.

Vučić has characterised the protests as foreign-backed attempts to destabilise the state, an allegation his opponents deny. Security forces have deployed police violence and detentions against demonstrators, while pro-government media have given extensive coverage to the president's campaigning tour of the country, where he has opened roads, distributed financial assistance and visited voters at home. An independent research bureau has filed a formal complaint accusing Vučić of using public institutions to promote his party, though anti-corruption authorities — which critics note are under government control — have not acted on the complaint.

Under Serbia's constitution, presidential elections must follow within three months of his resignation, meaning Serbians will vote twice before the end of the year. Parliamentary speaker and close Vučić ally Ana Brnabić, a former prime minister, will serve as acting president in the interim. Vučić also used his presidential pardon powers to release 49 people, including 23 students detained during protest-related incidents. Though the role of prime minister is formally more powerful than the presidency under Serbia's constitutional framework, Vučić routinely dominated executive decision-making throughout his two presidential terms.

The political stakes are considerable. Serbia's path toward EU membership has stalled amid concerns over democratic backsliding and the country's refusal to join Western sanctions on Russia following its invasion of Ukraine — an unresolved tension given Vučić's stated ambition to bring Serbia into the bloc. In a sign of the unusually charged atmosphere, a televised debate between a senior SNS figure and the Students Win candidate — the first in nearly a decade to feature opposing politicians on a channel not aligned with the government — drew the highest ratings of any programme in Serbia over the past month, underscoring how closely the country is watching the contest unfold.