Vucic: New cabinet to have at least 6 new ministers

Vucic: New cabinet to have at least 6 new ministers

Asked which departments are critical, the outgoing prime minister who will be given a new mandate said told the Belgrade-based Blic daily that "ministries of agriculture, education and health are very important."

However, he did not indicate whether these ministries would have new heads.

Vucic said he did not discuss a government coalition either with SPS leader Ivica Dacic, adding, "I did not want to," or with SDS leader Boris Tadic.

As for the first task of the new government, the leader of the SNS said "it will be everything we need to do to get a fourth and fifth review of the arrangement with the International Monetary Fund."

As the second task, he mentioned the steel mill Zelezara Smederevo, and the third - the copper smelter RTB Bor.

He said his long-term goal is to ensure that by 2020 “we can say that we have had an annual GDP growth, cumulatively, always over two or three percent, for six years in a row, which would mean that, thanks to the difficult reforms and the people that accepted and understood them, we have secured a golden age for Serbia”.

Asked when he will start negotiations on a coalition, Vucic said: “Whether we will start negotiations at all -that is the question. We will see.”

Vucic also told the newspaper it was"still early to talk about whether he will support Tomislav Nikolic in the 2017 presidential race."

He said that Nikolic "acted responsibly, adhered to the Constitution and did not make things harder for the Serbian government, although he could do that and boost his popularity ratings."

“He backed the tough government measures, did not aspire to score trivial political points for himself. We did not have the same take on certain issues, but he never made a show out of that,” Vucic said.

Asked whom he will support if SNS official Zorana Mihajlovic decides to run for the president, he replies:

“The SNS will have just one candidate in the presidential election, not two.”

Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic stepped down as SNS leader after winning the 2012 election.