Žika Gojković


Žika Gojković is a Serbian politician. He has served in the National Assembly of Serbia since 2008. Formerly a leading figure in the Serbian Renewal Movement, he left that party in May 2017 and became leader of the Movement for the Restoration of the Kingdom of Serbia later in the same year.

Early life and private career

Gojković was born in Sombor, Vojvodina, in what was then the Socialist Republic of Serbia in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. He has a bachelor of management studies degree in economy and was elected as president of Sombor's sports association in 2014.

Political career

Serbian Renewal Movement

Gojković was the chair of the SPO's provincial organization in Vojvodina for several years prior to his departure from the party, and was a vice-president of the party at the republic level. He was confirmed to a new term as party leader for Vojvodina in 2015.
He was included on the SPO's electoral lists for the 2000, 2003, and 2007 Serbian parliamentary elections. The party failed to cross the electoral threshold in 2000 and 2007, and in 2003 he was ultimately not selected as part of its assembly delegation.
For the 2008 election, the SPO joined the For a European Serbia list led by Boris Tadić's Democratic Party. Gojković received the thirty-ninth position on its list. The coalition won 102 seats and, this time, he was chosen as part of his party's parliamentary group. Tadić's alliance formed a coalition government after the election, and Gojković served as part of its parliamentary majority.
Serbia's electoral system was reformed in 2011, such that parliamentary mandates were awarded in numerical order to candidates on successful lists. For the 2012 parliamentary election, the SPO joined a coalition called Preokret, alternately known in English as Turnover or U-Turn. Gojković received the thirteenth position on the list and was re-elected when it won sixteen mandates. He served in opposition after the election.
The SPO contested the 2014 election as part of the Aleksandar Vučić — Future We Believe In electoral list led by the Serbian Progressive Party. Gojković received the forty-first position on the list and was easily returned when the alliance won a landslide victory with 158 out of 250 mandates. He received the eighty-second position on the successor Aleksandar Vučić – Serbia Is Winning list in 2016 and was re-elected when the alliance won 131 seats. Following the latter election, the SPO parliamentarians sat in caucus with the Progressive Party.

Movement for the Restoration of the Kingdom of Serbia

Several members of the SPO, including Gojković, were expelled from the party in May 2017 after recommending that party leader Vuk Drašković step down from his position to become an honorary president. Gojković and other expelled SPO members subsequently formed the POKS in early June. The party was officially registered on July 17, 2017, and Gojković was chosen as its leader on October 15, 2017. He continues to caucus with the Progressive Party, and, on being chosen as leader of the POKS, indicated his continued support of Serbian president Vučić.
Gojković is a deputy member of the parliamentary foreign affairs committee and the committee on finance, state budget, and control of public spending; the head of Serbia's parliamentary friendship group with Brazil; and a member of its parliamentary friendship groups with France, Italy, the Netherlands, and the United States of America.