Clash in Serbia's ruling coalition could prompt early elections

Feb 11, 2011, 10:46 GMT

Belgrade - Bickering within Serbia's ruling coalition spilled out into the open Friday, raising the prospect of elections a year earlier than scheduled.

Belgrade media are reporting that Deputy Premier Mladjan Dinkic has called into question the authority of Prime Minister Mirko Cvetkovic, saying that he lacked the necessary clout to do his job and that all power rested in the hands of President Boris Tadic.

'Our premier decides nothing. He is the premier and he should make decisions, but he doesn't,' Dinkic told a local TV station Thursday night. He slammed some other cabinet members as 'incompetent wimps.'

Though he has limited formal authority, Tadic is the most powerful politician in Serbia. Currently in his second term, he has also since 2004 been head of the Democratic Party, the biggest in parliament, which rules with Dinkic's G17 party.

G17 is the junior partner in Tadic's coalition, which has governed Serbia since 2008 with a slim, fragile majority. The alliance also includes the Socialist Party, led by Interior Minister Ivica Dacic.

Cvetkovic is an economic expert unaffiliated with any party. He was chosen for the premier's job by the coalition because he was seen as a political nonentity who could not overshadow the party leaders.

He fired back at Dinkic in an interview Friday in the Vecernje Novosti newspaper. 'Anybody's who's grown tired ... can freely leave the cabinet,' he said.

By contesting the authority of the government, Cvetkovic said, Dinkic was signalling that he wanted new elections before those scheduled in 2012. A snap poll would be 'very bad for Serbia,' Cvetkovic said.

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