As Serbia goes to the polls, a student-led movement has become the lead challengers to former president Aleksandar Vučić's dominance.
Voting has been taking place in Serbia, with the main contenders being the former president, Aleksandar Vučić's Serbian Progressive Party and surprisingly, the youth-backed Students' List.
What makes this race even more surprising is the fact the student-led movement is thought to be running very close to the SPP in the polls.
The group is reportedly fuelled by anger over corruption, government accountability and the state of its democracy.
The campaign has been marred by allegations of electoral manipulation, while Vučić's government has also faced international criticism over its approach to Russia and the legacy of the Balkan Wars.
Garrett Patrick Kelly, former UN diplomat and resident of Sarajevo, joined The Pat Kenny Show to speak about how the group has risen to challenge the former president in the election after nearly 14 years in power.
He said: "If you go back, this is the third kind of movement or uprising. The first one was called rubber ducks, and it was about waterfront development in Belgrade.
"[It involved] huge amounts of money, accusations of corruption, people got on the streets and it kind of died out. Then there was another one about lithium mining, and that also became a big nature movement and died out.
"This third one, I think really, it pushed people over the edge because what happened was there was an awning built at a railway station which collapsed, and then the government wouldn't release the tender documents.
"They wouldn't say who had been given it. There was allegations that it had been corruptly tendered to people who were incompetent.
"It killed 16 people and the students got on the streets [and] in spite of all of the agent provocateurs from the police and the government, they managed to keep their protests peaceful and they managed to get the rest of society to join them.
"They managed to do that and maintain that street protest for two years until they finally forced an election, which we're having today.
"I think what they want is they want an end to corruption, and that's their basic point of view."
Mr Kelly then shared a clip with listeners where Serbian film student, Mia, shared her story of how she got into the movement and how she was arrested when police tried to enter the Faculty of Law in Belgrade.
She shared: "Personally, I have struggled with many hardships in these two years. A year and a half ago, I was arrested in front of the Faculty of Law in Belgrade when policemen violently tried to get in said faculty for the first time since the Nazis did that, which is, by the way, against the constitution of the Republic of Serbia.
"During my arrest, three separate policemen held my hair at the same time and pulled me by the hair, trying to unlock my phone so they could retrieve videos I had filmed of the violence that transpired that night.
"I think today [October 25], speaking not only for myself, but for the people I know, for my colleagues whom I love, for my parents, I think what we want the most is to give this country finally back to its people, not to be marionettes pulled at with our pay grades or our studies or our literal hair so that everyone can rule their own lives and live in that sort of freedom.
"And I think today's day is a very liberating one in that sense."
The students aren't actually running in the election themselves but they have their list of candidates who are people who are capable of running a government, but who have no party affiliation.
