Shorouk Express
“Tonight, the calendar New Year begins, but for us it starts when all the demands of the student protest are met,” the students of the University of the Serbian city Novi Sad announced on New Year’s Eve in front of thousands of other citizens, as Aleksandar Latas reported for the Serbian daily Danas. The protests, led by the students themselves, began weeks ago in November, after the concrete roof of Novi Sad’s main railway station collapsed, killing 15 people.
From farmers and professors to musicians and priests, citizens from all walks of life have shown solidarity with the rebellious youth. One of the largest protests unfolded on 22 December, when tens of thousands rallied against Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić’s (SNS, right wings) populist government, as shown in the “Photo of the Day” of the Bulgarian newspaper Kapital. In Danas, former mayor of Belgrade and ambassador of Serbia Milan St. Protić described Vučić as “guilty of the fall of the Novi Sad roof and the death of fifteen innocent people. You are the most guilty and the first accused. The other culprits obeyed your orders. […] Their guilt comes after yours and springs from yours.”
According to the same newspaper quoting Vučić’s interview on the Serbian public radio RTS, the president thinks that students are looking for “anti-systemic solutions” and that he has discussed with educators but couldn’t reach an agreement because the union representatives changed their demands. Besides, Serbia’s Prime Minister Miloš Vučević pointed out that “professors who do not want to teach will no longer work in education, while students who do not come to classes will receive unjustified absences.”
Romanians rally for presidential ballot resumption
After Romania’s constitutional court cancelled the first round of the presidential elections, held on 24 November, small groups of citizens staged sporadic protests. To bolster the movement, the opposing far-right Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) announced a massive protest on 12 January “against the abusive decision of the regime led by [president] Klaus Iohannis,” as quoted in AUR’s press release detailed by Andrei Stan on Romanian online news platform HotNews. “Tens of thousands of Romanians from all over the country and from the diaspora will gather to demand the respect of their vote, the resumption of the second round [of the presidential elections], but also the fall of the Iohannis regime.”
The lack of full transparency behind Constitutional Court’s decision is one of the reasons that led to the protests. Romanian investigative outlet Context tried to obtain the documents that would clarify the court’s ruling, but without success. “The Iohannis Presidential Administration refuses to provide essential documents related to the presidential elections annulled by the Constitutional Court,” wrote Context’s co-founder Attila Biro.
Turkey protests after a disappointing wage increase
On Christmas Eve, Turkish Minister of Labour and Social Security Vedat Işıkhan announced that the minimum wage in Turkey would rise by 30%, reaching TL 22,107 (€603) in 2025. “May it be beneficial for our country and nation,” nationalist president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan wrote shortly after the announcement, as reported by the Turkish daily Cumhuriyet. “In 2025, it will not be possible to make ends meet with this minimum wage, there will be an election,” said the opposing CHP (Republican People’s Party; centre-left) leader Özgür Özel after visiting the Confederation of Turkish Trade Unions. “This is a disaster. But we will not be discouraged by this. We will fight and […] we will achieve important gains. The most significant win is that this anti-labour government has quickly fallen from the people’s hearts and eyes. They will also fall from power in the first election that will be held,” Özel promised, as quoted by the Turkish newspaper Habertürk.
Since the Confederation of Turkish Trade Unions demanding a pay rise of 74% and the inflation is likely to remain high, strikes may be called. Thousands of people have already gathered in Ankara to protest and call on the government to resign, as reported by Huseyin Hayatsever of Reuters. “The new minimum wage rate was an admission by the government’s economic team that its programme to rein in inflation was not working,” journalist William Sellars from business news platform Arabian Gulf Business Insight concluded after talking with Professor Emre Alkin, economist and dean of Istanbul’s Topkapı University.
Bulgaria and Romania become full Schengen members
On a more positive note, Bulgaria and Romania became full members of the Schengen area on 1 January 2025, when their internal land borders were lifted. “The benefits for Bulgaria from entering the Schengen area are estimated at around 1.6 billion leva (€818 million) per year by the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. They will be in all areas – in the economy, in rapid transit, in tourism and especially for carriers, for whom this is their main business,” said Bulgarian Prime Minister Dimitar Glavchev, as quoted by Lily Granitska of news platform Mediapool.bg.
