BELGRADE: DIFFERING ASSESSMENTS OF ELECTORAL FAILURE

BELGRADE, Oct 14 (Hina) - Reactions to Sunday's failed second round of a Serbian presidential election, at which the turnout was below the required 50 percent, were forthcoming on Monday and consisted mainly of different views of how to resolve the "presidential crisis". #L# Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Zarko Korac told Fonet agency that every candidate got "his number" of votes (around one million) in the first round, which showed where the support of the electorate really lay, while the second round saw "manoeuvring" and some political parties "lending" Vojislav Kostunica some one million votes. The leader of the Alliance of Vojvodina Hungarians, Jozef Kasa, told the media the fact that the elections had failed was not the end of the world, and that in the second round, Kostunica had won the votes of those sympathising both the radicals and the socialists. Yugoslav Interior Minister Zoran Zivkovic, a senior official of Zoran Djindjic's Democratic Party, said the fact that voters had not gone to the polls was due to a negative campaign against the Serbian government and PM Djindjic. Presidential elections should be postponed and changing the Constitution considered, he added. The president of the Serbian Constitutional Court, Slobodan Vucetic, also advocated drawing up a new Constitution and changing the strict electoral rules in the second round. (hina) ha sb