A three-day pro-government rally titled “We will not give up Serbia” began in the Serbian capital this evening, as President Aleksandar Vucic seeks to reassert control following months of anti-government demonstrations.

The rally is a response to months of student and opposition protests triggered by the collapse of a canopy roof at Novi Sad train station on November 1, 2024. The incident, seen by many as emblematic of broader institutional decay, has galvanised discontent with Vucic’s administration.

Seeking to counter the wave of opposition, Vucic aims to draw as many as 200,000 supporters to Belgrade this weekend. Critics, however, allege the government is resorting to old tactics to manufacture mass turnout, including organising fleets of buses from surrounding towns and villages and exerting pressure on public sector employees to attend.

As the rally got underway on April 11, key arteries of the capital were closed off, while white tents and food stalls began to appear across the city centre. The festive atmosphere was met with mockery by opposition figures.

“Vucic’s flying circus,” quipped political scientist Srđan Cvijić on Friday morning, referring to the makeshift tents that flapped chaotically in the wind, briefly taking flight.

Later in the day, government officials unveiled what they claimed was “the longest flag in the history of Serbia,” while groups of supporters from Kosovo arrived, some holding banners reading “Kosovo is with Vucic”. The festivities continued with singer Dragica Radosavljević Cakana performing for the crowd, as fresh contingents of students from Novi Sad joined in, chanting “Novi Sad Serbia”.

Vucic plays chess with students “who want to learn”

On Thursday evening, in an attempt to energise his supporters ahead of the rally, Vucic visited a group of “contra-students” camping out in Pionirski Park, who have been calling for an end to the student blockades and for the re-opening of universities.

Vucic played a game of chess with some of the students, quipping: “For months, our country was in chess... not in checkmate, but in check.”

The move comes as part of a wider push to outmanoeuvre the student-led opposition. Late on Thursday night, a convoy of tractors – echoing previous farmer protests in support of student demonstrators – rolled into the capital under police escort.

In a social media post on April 8, Vucic had issued a rallying cry to his supporters: “Workers, peasants, householders, housewives, pensioners and youth” were all urged to join the rally to “defend” Serbia from what he characterised as internal and foreign threats to national stability.

Kosovan Serbs and the “silent majority”

Among the early arrivals were approximately 150 Kosovo Serbs, who travelled over 250 kilometres on foot to show their support for Vucic and his newly launched Movement for the People and State.

A separate group of young attendees from Novi Sad claimed to represent the  “silent majority” backing the president.

Still, Vucic's effort to consolidate his base faces a daunting challenge. Opposition rallies in recent weeks have drawn massive crowds – most notably a demonstration on March 15 in the capital, where estimates placed attendance at over 300,000, dwarfing projections for this weekend’s pro-government turnout.

Students cycle to Strasbourg

While Vucic courts his supporters at home, students opposed to his rule are taking their campaign abroad.

A group of 80 students set off on bicycles from Belgrade on April 3, heading toward Strasbourg in a 1,300-kilometre journey aimed at delivering their demands directly to EU officials. Along the route, the students have received warm receptions from university peers and members of the Serbian diaspora in cities such as Bratislava, Vienna and Linz.

Two can play that game

The president is seeking to prove that he, too, can mobilise mass support, bring tractors to the capital and fill the streets. But with declining public support, Vucic has a hard task at hand.

The scale and spontaneity of anti-government mobilisation in the last four months suggests a growing weariness with Vucic's brand of politics. 

This weekend’s rally will serve as a temporary distraction. But the government will have to do a lot more than staging a large funfair to move past the current state of protest and unrest.