Belgrade’s Vidovdan Protest: Was It 8,222 People or Just 36? The Police and Students Are in Total Disagreement!
Chaos Over Crowd Numbers The Vidovdan protest at Slavija Square in Belgrade turned into a full-blown battle of numbers. Student group Blokada claimed around 8,222 people showed up, while the police reported only about 36 participants at the unregistered gathering! Yes, you read that right — 36 people! The difference of thousands sounds like the students and police were watching completely different events.
Who’s to Believe? The Public Gatherings Archive, which published the estimate of 8,222, warned the final number could vary by 10%, but that still means the crowd was many times larger than the police estimate. The police even compared this protest to one on December 22 last year, which also had about 36 people — three times fewer than the protest on March 15. So either the police forgot how to count, or the students have superpowers to attract tens of thousands without leaving a trace.
Why Such a Huge Gap? This massive difference in estimates raises many questions. Is the police deliberately downplaying the crowd to minimize the protest’s significance? Or are the students exaggerating to show more support? Either way, it’s clear communication between the two sides is poor, and trust in official sources is shaky.
What Happened at the Protest? The protest was organized by the student group Blokada and held on Vidovdan, an important date in Serbian history. A moment of commemorative silence was observed, highlighting the seriousness of the gathering. However, the actual number of attendees remains a mystery, as the estimates are so wildly different it’s hard to know the truth.
Conclusion: Counting or Fairy Tale? This case perfectly shows how numbers can be manipulated and how different players have their own versions of the truth. Some say the protest was massive and significant, others reduce it to just a few dozen people. Either way, it’s clear Belgrade remains a place where the fight for truth and numbers happens both on the streets and in the media.
If you were at the protest or have your own take on these numbers, feel free to drop a comment — maybe together we’ll figure out where all those people disappeared to or how protests are counted in Serbia! Who knows, maybe next time the police and students will agree on the numbers, but until then — let the number games continue!
