Nenad Konstantinović


Nenad Konstantinović is a politician in Serbia. He was a prominent member of the student movement Otpor! in the late 1990s and early 2000s, later served in the National Assembly as a member of the Democratic Party, and has been a Social Democratic Party member of the assembly since 2016.

Early life and activism

Konstantinović was born in Belgrade, then a part of the Socialist Republic of Serbia in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Trained as a lawyer, he served as vice-president of the Glavnog odbora Studentskog protesta group from 1996 to 1997 and was vice-president of Serbia's Student Parliament from 1997 to 1998.
A vocal critic of Slobodan Milošević's government, Konstantinović became a founding member of the opposition group Otpor! in 1998. In September of the following year, he issued the organization's "Declaration for Serbia's future," which called for the resignation of Milošević and "free and democratic elections for a constitutive assembly, under the rules and complete control of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe." He also called for an alliance of "all Serbian democratic forces" around the goals of the manifesto. Konstantinović later became involved in organizing Otpor's daily protests against Milošević in May 2000, arguing during this time that the regime would need to fall as a precondition for democratic change.
Milošević and his allies fell from power in October 2000, and an alliance of opposition parties formed new administrations in both Serbia and Yugoslavia. Konstantinović helped operate a volunteer organization called the Service for Enforcement of Truth in this period, documenting abuses of power by Miloševic-era officials in order to initiate criminal prosecutions. He urged Serbia's leaders to arrest Milošević, although he acknowledged the difficulties prosecutors would face in this matter. "We don't have any documents with a signature," he said. " used to give orders by telephone to his cronies so you can only arrest people like Rade Marković and Mihalj Kertes and press them to talk." Following the arrest of Milošević, he urged the government to extradite him to the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in The Hague.

Political career

Konstantinović joined the Democratic Party in 1998 and was a member of the Assembly of the City of Belgrade.
Otpor! became an organized political party in 2003, and Konstantinović appeared on its electoral list in the 2003 Serbian parliamentary election. The party did not receive enough support to cross the electoral threshold to win representation in the assembly. Konstantinović was subsequently critical of Serbian prime minister Vojislav Koštunica's administration for including Miloševic-era officials.
Otpor! merged into the Democratic Party in September 2004, and Konstantinović signed an accord with Slobodan Gavrilović of the Democratic Party to formalize the arrangement. Konstantinović served on the executive of the Democratic Party from 2004 to 2008.

Member of the National Assembly (Democratic Party)

Konstantinović received the 103th position on the Democratic Party's electoral list, which was largely organized in alphabetical order, in the 2007 Serbian parliamentary election. The list won sixty-four mandates, and Konstantinović was included in the party's parliamentary delegation. The Democratic Party joined a coalition government after the election, and Konstantinović served as part of its parliamentary majority.
The Democratic Party contested the 2008 Serbian parliamentary election at the head of the For a European Serbia coalition. Konstantinović was again included in the coalition's electoral list and, when the list won 102 mandates, in the Democratic Party's delegation. The Democratic Party and its allies formed government after this election, and Konstantinović again served on the government side. In January 2009, he replaced Tomislav Nikolić as chair of the parliamentary administrative committee. In this capacity, he initiated the launch of an "e-parliament" for the assembly. He also led a working group reviewing the assembly's code of conduct in the same period.
Serbia's electoral system was reformed in 2011, such that parliamentary mandates were awarded in numerical order to candidates on successful lists. Konstantinović was given the sixty-fourth position on the Democratic Party's Choice for a Better Life coalition list in the 2012 election and narrowly won direct re-election when the list won sixty-seventh mandates. The Serbian Progressive Party and its allies formed government after the election, and the Democratic Party moved into opposition.

Member of the National Assembly (Social Democratic Party)

The Democratic Party experienced a significant split after the 2012 election, with several members including Konstantinović joining the breakaway New Democratic Party under Boris Tadić's leadership. This party contested the 2014 Serbian parliamentary election as a fusion party with the Greens of Serbia and in alliance with the League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina, and other parties. Konstantinović received the twenty-eighth position on the alliance's list; the list won eighteen seats, and Konstantinović was not returned to the assembly. The New Democratic Party later renamed itself as the Social Democratic Party.
Konstantinović received the tenth position on the "Alliance for a Better Serbia" list for the 2016 election and returned to parliament when the list won thirteen seats. The election was again won by the Progressive Party and its allies, and Konstantinović again serves as an opposition member. He is currently the deputy chair of the committee on administrative, budgetary, mandate, and immunity issues; a member of the committee on spatial planning, transport, infrastructure, and telecommunications; a deputy member of the committee on the economy, regional development, trade, tourism, and energy; and a member of the parliamentary friendship groups for Croatia, Germany, Italy, Macedonia, Qatar, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America.
In 2019, Konstantinović, along with Marko Đurišić joined a new organization called Serbia 21. Boris Tadić, the president of the Social Democratic Party denounced this move and stated that the party was in the process of expelling Đurišić and Konstantinović. In March 2020, Serbia 21 announced their participation in the 2020 Serbian parliamentary election as a part of the United Democratic Serbia coalition along with the Party of Modern Serbia, League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina, and the Civic Democratic Forum, and some national minority parties. Konstantinović holds the second position on the list.
Konstantinović has also served as a member of the municipal assembly of Savski Venac in Belgrade.