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Veroljub Arsić

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Veroljub Arsić (Serbian Cyrillic: Верољуб Арсић; born August 28, 1969) is a politician in Serbia. He has served in the National Assembly of Serbia since 2001, originally as a member of the Serbian Radical Party and since 2008 as a member of the Serbian Progressive Party. He is a deputy speaker of the assembly.

Early life and career

Arsić was born in Požarevac, then part of the Socialist Republic of Serbia in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. His graduated from the high school of electrical engineering in Kostolac, was appointed director of a business centre in Požarevac in January 1990, and has operated his own business in the city since 1992.[1]

Political career

Radical Party

Arsić ran as a candidate of Vojislav Šešelj's far-right Radical Party in the 2000 Serbian parliamentary election, receiving the twenty-sixth position (out of 250) on its electoral list.[2] The Radicals won twenty-three seats, down from eighty-two in the previous election, and became in the process the second-largest opposition party in the legislature. Arsić was included in the party's parliamentary delegation after the election and took his seat when the assembly met in early 2001. (From 2000 to 2011, Serbian parliamentary mandates were awarded to sponsoring parties or coalitions rather than to individual candidates, and it was common practice for mandates to be awarded out of numerical order.)[3]

Arsić was again included in the Radical Party's parliamentary delegation after the 2003 election, in which he received the twentieth list position;[4] the Radicals won eighty-two seats to become the largest group in the assembly, although they did not have a majority of seats and did not form government. During the 2004 Serbian presidential election, Arsić took part in at least one major rally with Radical Party candidate Tomislav Nikolić; a media report described him as a party official.[5]

He received the seventy-seventh position on the Radical Party's list for the 2007 parliamentary election[6] and the seventh-four position in the 2008 election,[7] and was again included in the party's delegation each time. The Radical Party remained in opposition.

Progressive Party

After the 2008 election, Arsić joined a group of twenty-one parliamentarians who left the Radical Party to form the breakaway Serbian Progressive Party, a pro-European Union conservative grouping under Nikolić's leadership. A newspaper article from 2010 described him as a director of the new party.[8]

Serbia's electoral system was reformed in 2011, such that parliamentary mandates were awarded in numerical order to candidates on successful lists. In the 2012 parliamentary election, Arsić received the forty-first position on the Progressive Party's Let's Get Serbia Moving alliance list and was declared re-elected when the list won seventy-three seats.[9] The Progressive Party subsequently became the dominant force in a coalition government, and Arsić served as the party's whip in the assembly.[10]

Rumours circulated in 2013 that Radical Party leader Vojislav Šešelj would be permitted to return to Serbia from the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, where he was then facing charges for war crimes, and various Serbian politicians speculated on how his return could impact the country's political scene. Arsić was quoted as saying, "[Šešelj] could hardly bring the [Radical Party] back to the assembly if he persists with the rhetoric of 10 years ago. Serbia has taken another course and he cannot understand that. Myself, I am very much prepared for his rhetoric and debates because I know him better than others."[11] Šešelj ultimately did not return to Serbia at this time, although he did so following a provisional release by the tribunal the following year.

Arsić received the thirteenth position on the Aleksandar Vučić — Future We Believe In list fronted by the Progressive Party in the 2014 parliamentary election and was easily returned when the list won a majority of 158 out of 250 seats.[12] He was appointed as a deputy speaker after the election,[13] a position he continues to hold to the present day. He was also appointed as chair of the assembly's committee on finance; in May 2014, he announced that a revised budget by Vučić's administration would introduce low-interest state-subsidized loans.[14]

In May 2014, Arsić led a Serbian delegation to the South-East European Cooperation Process (SEECP). He attempted to steer a middle course on between Russian and European interests, noting that the Serbian delegation "did not support [SEECP's] statement on the crisis in Ukraine, due to the controversial wording about 'annexation of Crimea,' but did not block its adoption either."[15]

Arsić received the twenty-second position on the Aleksandar Vučić – Serbia Is Winning list in the 2016 parliamentary election and was returned to a seventh term in parliament when the alliance won a second consecutive majority.[16] He is currently a member of the parliamentary committee on finance, state budget and control of public spending; a member of the committee on the rights of the child; chair of the parliamentary friendship group to Greece; and a member of the parliamentary friendship groups to Azerbaijan, Belarus, China, Cuba, the Czech Republic, Indonesia, Iraq, Ireland, Japan, Romania, Russia, and the United Kingdom.[17]

Arsić is also a Progressive Party member of the Požarevac municipal assembly.[18]

References

  1. ^ Veroljub Arsic, National Assembly of Serbia, accessed 17 February 2017.
  2. ^ Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 23. децембра 2000. године и 10. јануара 2001. године, ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ {Српска радикална странка – др Војислав Шешељ), Republika Srbija - Republička izborna komisija, accessed 17 February 2017.
  3. ^ Serbia's Law on the Election of Representatives (2000) stipulated that parliamentary mandates would be awarded to electoral lists (Article 80) that crossed the electoral threshold (Article 81), that mandates would be given to candidates appearing on the relevant lists (Article 83), and that the submitters of the lists were responsible for selecting their parliamentary delegations within ten days of the final results being published (Article 84). See Law on the Election of Representatives (Article 92), Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia, No. 35/2000, made available via LegislationOnline, accessed 28 February 2017.
  4. ^ Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 28. децембра 2003. године, ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (СРПСКА РАДИКАЛНА СТРАНКА - др ВОЈИСЛАВ ШЕШЕЉ), Republika Srbija - Republička izborna komisija, accessed 17 February 2017.
  5. ^ "Serbia: Nikolic plans to seek premier's resignation if elected president," British Broadcasting Corporation Monitoring European, 24 May 2004 (Source: text of report by Serbian news agency Beta).
  6. ^ Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 21. јануара и 8. фебрауара 2007. године, ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (Српска радикална странка - др Војислав Шешељ), Republika Srbija - Republička izborna komisija, accessed 17 February 2017.
  7. ^ Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 11. маја 2008. године, ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (СРПСКА РАДИКАЛНА СТРАНКА - Др ВОЈИСЛАВ ШЕШЕЉ), Republika Srbija - Republička izborna komisija, accessed 17 February 2017. It is not clear if the lower positions amounted to a demotion.
  8. ^ "Serbia: Opinion poll shows president party's ahead, Liberals in third place," British Broadcasting Corporation Monitoring European, 2 July 2010 (Source: text of report by Serbian newspaper Danas website on 1 July).
  9. ^ Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине, 6. маj 2012. године, ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (POKRENIMO SRBIJU - TOMISLAV NIKOLIĆ), Republika Srbija - Republička izborna komisija, accessed 26 January 2017.
  10. ^ "Serbian MPs sceptical about Kosovo platform delay," British Broadcasting Corporation Monitoring European, 16 November 2012 (Source: text of report by Serbian newspaper Vecernje novosti website on 13 November)
  11. ^ "Serbian commentary views Progressive Party's decision on cabinet reshuffle," British Broadcasting Corporation Monitoring European, 19 June 2013 (Source: text of report by Serbian newspaper Blic website on 16 June).
  12. ^ Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 16. и 23. марта 2014. године, ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (ALEKSANDAR VUČIĆ - BUDUĆNOST U KOJU VERUJEMO), Republika Srbija - Republička izborna komisija, accessed 26 January 2017.
  13. ^ Namanja Cabric, "Gojkovic elected Serbian parliament speaker," Xinhua News Agency, 23 April 2014.
  14. ^ "Tandem Financial - Serbian Daily Report, May 12, 2014," Emerging Markets Broker Reports Central Eastern Europe, 12 May 2014.
  15. ^ "Serbian officials instructed not to vote against Russia," British Broadcasting Corporation Monitoring European, 14 May 2014 (Source: text of report in English by Serbian pro-western Belgrade-based Radio B92 website, on 14 May).
  16. ^ Избори за народне посланике 2016. године » Изборне листе (АЛЕКСАНДАР ВУЧИЋ - СРБИЈА ПОБЕЂУЈЕ), Republika Srbija - Republička izborna komisija, accessed 17 February 2017.
  17. ^ Veroljub Arsic, National Assembly of Serbia, accessed 17 February 2017.
  18. ^ VEROLJUB ARSIĆ, Otvoreni Parlament, accessed 20 July 2017.
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