Saša Milenić () is šaMilenića politician in Serbia. A resident of Kragujevac, he was for many years a close ally of longtime mayor Veroljub Stevanović and a member of the latter's Together for Šumadija (Zajedno za Šumadiju) party. He also served in the National Assembly of Serbia for most of the period from 2008 to 2014.
Milenić later broke with Stevanović and became a member of the Movement of Free Citizens (Pokret slobodnih građana, PSG) and the leader of the Association of the Šumadija Region, which held collective membership in the PSG. He announced his withdrawal from politics in early 2020.
Early life and career
Milenić was born in Foča, in what was then the Socialist Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. He is a graduate of the University of Belgrade Faculty of Philosophy and a teacher at First Kragujevac High School. He has published four books of poetry and essays.
Politician
Early years
Milenić became politically active in 1996 as a member of the Zajedno (Together) coalition, an unstable alliance of political parties opposed to Slobodan Milošević's administration. The Zajendo name ceased to be used in most municipalities after 1997, but it remained as the name of Stevanović's local political movement in Kragujevac for many years thereafter. Milenić was a prominent member of this organization.
At the republic level, both Stevanović and Milenić were initially members of the Serbian Renewal Movement (Srpski pokret obnove, SPO). Milenić appeared on the SPO's electoral list in the 2000 Serbian parliamentary election; the list did not cross the threshold to win representation in the assembly.
The SPO formed an alliance with New Serbia (Nova Srbija, NS) for the 2003 Serbian parliamentary election. Milenić appeared in the thirty-eighth position on their combined list, which won twenty-two mandates. From 2000 to 2011, parliamentary mandates in Serbia were awarded at the discretion of the sponsoring parties and coalitions, and it was common practice for seats to be assigned out of numerical order; the SPO could have selected Milenić as a member of its assembly delegation, but it ultimately did not. Following local elections in 2004, Milenić became the deputy mayor of Kragujevac, a position he held for the next four years.
The SPO experienced a serious split in 2005, and both Stevanović and Milenić joined a breakaway group called the Serbian Democratic Renewal Movement (Srpski Demokratski Pokret Obnove, SDPO). The new party contested the 2007 Serbian parliamentary election on an electoral list led by New Serbia and the Democratic Party of Serbia (Demokratska stranka Srbije, DSS). Milenić was included on the list, which won forty-seven seats; he was once again not selected for a mandate.
Parliamentarian and president of the city assembly
Stevanović and Milenić affiliated with the G17 Plus alliance following the 2007 election. This alliance participated in the 2008 Serbian parliamentary election as part of the For a European Serbia list led by the Democratic Party (Demokratska stranka, DS). The list won 102 mandates, and on this occasion both Stevanović and Milenić were chosen to represent their party in the assembly. The DS and its allies formed a coalition government after the election, and Stevanović and Milenić served as supporters of the ministry.
Milenić also received the third position on the Zajedno list in the 2008 Serbian local elections, which were held concurrently with the parliamentary election. The list won a plurality victory with forty-one out of eighty-seven seats. Milenić was selected for a mandate in the local assembly and was subsequently chosen as its president (i.e., speaker).
In 2009, Stevanović launched Together for Šumadija as a new political party at the republic level; Milenić was a member. Despite working as a separate entity, the new party maintained an alliance with G17 Plus. Both Stevanović and Milenić resigned from the national assembly in September 2011, due to a determination that changes in Serbian law had made their functions in government at the municipal level incompatible with serving in the legislature. (It was later clarified that serving as president of a local assembly did not create a conflict of interest and that parliamentarians could hold this role on a concurrent basis.)