Residents of the Mur settlement and citizens of Novi Pazar, Serbia, blocked the road leading through the settlement towards Montenegro for an hour today, protesting the frequent traffic accidents and casualties.
They blocked the street with a tow truck, from which several speakers on an improvised podium announced blockades "every following Friday for 29 minutes."
The direct cause for today's protest is an accident in which 16-year-old Samed Alić was seriously injured, after he was hit by a car accompanying Serbian government minister and president of the Justice and Reconciliation Party (SPP) Usama Zukorlić on a widening and outside the traffic lane.
According to one of the speakers, accidents and serious traffic accidents occur daily in that settlement, in which 29 of their fellow citizens have lost their lives in the last forty years.
"Enough is enough. From now on, we will block this road every Friday from 14 to 15 pm, until the authorities meet our demands," stressed Asmir Alić, the injured man's uncle.
The speakers emphasized that nothing more was required, except for basic safety solutions: sidewalks, quality video surveillance, and increased traffic police presence, "which local authorities promised but failed to deliver," after a previous accident in which a girl was killed and a large citizen protest.
"We are asking for safety and the right to walk on the sidewalk without fear. If they don't hear us now, they will hear us when we block the road next time," said one of the speakers to several hundred gathered citizens.
The protest was organized in the shadow of a real small "media war" between portals and accounts supporting the SPP and the Sandžak Democratic Party (SDP), whose cadres support the Government of Serbia and the Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), reports the Beta agency.
More than two years ago, a seventeen-year-old boy, driving a Golf with a probationary driver's license, hit a girl at a pedestrian crossing, who died from her injuries.
After citizen protests, local authorities promised "major investments" in that section of the road, of which only physical speed bumps, a speed indicator, and marked pedestrian crossings were installed.
Meanwhile, Nusreta Bučan was also killed in the same neighborhood.
Shortly after the latest accident and the announcement of the protest, Tourism Minister Husein Memić announced that the Serbian Government would invest hundreds of millions of dinars "in the road infrastructure of Novi Pazar".
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