Democratic Party of Socialists of Montenegro

Repeat polls were held in Danilovgrad, Kolasin and Bijelo Polje on Sunday due to reports of significant irregularities but the ruling Democratic Party of Socialists, DPS, remained the overall victor.

The DPS took the largest amount of seats in all three municipalities but only won an outright majority in Danilovgrad.

The leader of the main opposition Democratic Front, Miodrag Lekic, on Thursday said negotiations with the Socialist People's Party and the coalition of the Social Democratic Party and Positive Montenegro on forming an authority in the capital would start after June 10.

The director of MANS, Vanja Calovic, along with activists Dejan Milovac and Vuk Maras, said they were assaulted on Tuesday by a municipal election commission officer to whom they were attempting to hand over complaints about alleged irregularities at the polls on Sunday.

Months of verbal warfare between local watchdog MANS and Montenegro's ruling party Democratic Party of Socialists, DPS, ahead of May’s local elections in the capital, peaked on Wednesday with mutual accusations about scandals, abuse of state resources and corruption.

Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic, head of the ruling Democratic Party of Socialists, DPS, said the struggle to seek control of Podgorica will be "the toughest election battle" his party has faced since the independence referendum back in 2006. 

After months of speculation about who will succeed Mugosa as mayor of the capital, the ruling Democratic Party of Socialists, DPS, on Thursday named the Minister of Education, Slavoljub Stijepovic, as head of the list in the Podgorica local elections scheduled for May.

The threat of a boycott was unleashed after the ruling Democratic Party of Socialists, DPS, on Tuesday voted against six EU-backed election laws aimed at curbing abuses in the electoral process.

The laws mainly address suspected irregularities in voter lists and abuses in the use of budgetary funds for party purposes during elections.