Belgrade, April 24, 2020                                                                                                                                                                                         

PUBLIC STATEMENT 

ALL NATIONAL ASSEMBLY MEMBERS
SHOULD ATTEND THE UPCOMING ASSEMBLY SESSION

Forum for Security and Democracy welcomes the announcement for the next session of the National Assembly that should take place sometime at the start of next week. We consider this a positive development in general which takes parliamentary democracy off of national emergency “life support” and marks a turning point in the fight against the coronavirus epidemic.

It is the view of Forum for Security and Democracy that the upcoming assembly session will be of key importance for the reassessment of the necessity of government acts that restrict and curtail civil liberties during the pandemic, as well as the act with which a state of emergency has been instated in the first place.

The upcoming session of the National Assembly also represents a unique opportunity for the voices of assembly members who are not a part of the ruling majority to be heard and we express our hope and expectations that their presence at that session won’t be marginalized and that they will have a chance to, without any obstruction or belittling, express their views on the current situation in the country.

Bearing that in mind, Forum for Security and Democracy encourages all National Assembly members to take part in the upcoming Assembly session and in doing so reclaim at least some of the credibility that they lost through their passivity at the very beginning of this crisis.

This encouragement especially applies to those political parties represented in the Assembly that were boycotting the National Assembly prior to the coronavirus epidemic.

Forum for Security and Democracy trusts that this state of emergency that has been in effect for six weeks unambiguously demonstrates the repercussions of disregarding the National Assembly and the significance of participation in its proceedings for the rights and interests of all of Serbia’s citizens!

Opting not to take part in the National Assembly, after everything that happened up to this point during this state of emergency and all the lamentations about the state of parliamentary democracy in Serbia, would be a uniquely bad message to the citizens of Serbia who’s consequences said political parties quite certainly can’t afford to face.