Original article (in Serbian) was published on 18/3/2025; Author: Milica Ljubičić
Almost every protest or political crisis in the country in recent years has often been accompanied by tabloid narratives claiming that Croats are behind them or that their goal is to overthrow the government in Serbia. Similar accusations are being repeated during the current student blockades of faculties. This time, Informer used a report from Croatia’s RTL about the March 15 protests in Belgrade as “evidence”. The original report discusses the scale of the protests, analyzes their potential further development, and compares them to the changes of October 5, while highlighting key differences. However, Informer selectively extracted only the segments from the five-minute video that mention the possibility of a change in government and the comparison to October 5, while omitting parts that provide context and emphasize the scale of the protests. Additionally, the tabloid manipulated the content by adding a sinister musical background that creates an atmosphere of tension, something that does not exist in the original RTL report.
Even four months into the faculty blockades in Serbia, tabloids continue to search for “culprits”, frequently blaming individuals or neighboring countries for orchestrating the blockades and allegedly calling for the overthrow of Aleksandar Vucic. For some pro-regime media, Croats are often seen as the frequent “culprits” for everything happening in Serbia.
Today, the web portal Informer published an article of only seven sentences, in which the headline accuses Croats of “publicly calling for an October 5th scenario!” and allegedly “demanding the violent overthrow of Vucic”.
As the main “evidence” of this alleged call for Vucic’s overthrow, the tabloid published a manipulatively edited two-minute video composed of excerpts from a report on the student protest in Belgrade on March 15, which was broadcast on Croatia’s RTL in the show Direkt.
Informer selectively extracted only the segments from RTL’s five-minute video where the journalist questions the possibility of a change in government in Serbia and compares the current blockades to October 5, while omitting parts that provide context and emphasize the scale of the protests.
Thus, Informer omitted the beginning of the report prepared by journalist Petar Panjkota, which showed the mass turnout of the March 15 protest in Belgrade, using drone footage accompanied by the EKV song Zemlja za nas, while the journalist stated that it was the largest protest in Serbia’s history. Also left out was the part listing all the foreign media that reported on the protest and mentioning that the students received support from Manu Chao, Madonna, and Severina.
The tabloid also avoided publishing statements from two protest participants who expressed their opinions, that all of this brings hope for change, that justice will come to light, and that they want fair and honest elections.
Informer further omitted the part of the report in which a female student told RTL that “Saturday is definitely not D-Day, the struggle continues until the demands are met”.
The RTL journalist concluded his report with a question about whether the same protest would take place on April 15 and whether the main slogan would remain “Pumpaj”. He then mentioned the so-called “students” who stayed in Pionirski Park, demanding to return to faculties, while also providing context for the origin of the term “caci”.
The journalist also pointed out that the camp in Pionirski Park was named Cacilend and that, in addition to paid extras, hooligans and tractors were brought in. Finally, he noted that “the risk of violence is increasing. And for many, confirmation of this came on Saturday at 7:11 PM”. At that moment, the video showed people in Kralja Milana Street running and splitting into two groups after an incident with an unsettling noise.
None of this was visible in the video published on Informer’s web portal.
To further enhance the maliciousness of RTL’s report, Informer added an ominous musical background to its video, something that does not exist at any point in the original RTL report.
What does Informer base its claims on?
Informer took only the parts of RTL’s report that could, in some way, cast doubt on the ongoing protests.
The claims of an alleged call for Vucic’s overthrow were largely based on statements made by former Deputy Prime Minister in Djindjic’s government, Zarko Korac, who stated in RTL’s report that “political demands are necessary”.
“After all, everyone who welcomed the students, everywhere, preparing food for them, know that this is a protest against Vucic”. At this point, Informer cut off Korac’s statement, omitting the part where he added: “And that his government is responsible for corruption and the collapse of that canopy. So now it will be interesting to see what the students will say”.
However, Informer included Korac’s later statement from the report, in which he said that “this (the protest) cannot go on indefinitely” and that “an incident will happen”.
“People will get tired and will have had enough of this government”, he stated.
Additionally, recalling the October 5 civil protests that led to Slobodan Milosevic acknowledging his electoral defeat, asking what would happen next, and pointing out the differences between the October 5 protests and the current ones were reasons which Informer used to manipulatively claim that Croats are calling for October 5.
Today, Raskrinkavanje.me confirmed that Croats did not call for the violent overthrow of Vucic.
