Serb nationalist Tomislav Nikolic upset the odds to defeat incumbent Boris Tadic in a presidential run-off Sunday but vowed to pursue his predecessor's drive for the Balkans nation to join the EU.
Newly elected Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic, leader of Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), arrives at his party headquarters in Belgrade. Incumbent Boris Tadic on Sunday conceded defeat in Serbia's presidential vote and congratulated his nationalist challenger Nikolic.
Nikolic, a one-time ally of the late Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic, led with 49.4 percent in 70 percent of polling stations surveyed while Tadic trailed at 47.4 percent, estimates by independent election monitor CESID showed.
Preliminary results from Serbia's electoral commission RIK based on 40.67 percent of votes counted gave Nikolic 50.21 percent over 46.77 for Tadic, with invalid votes accounting for the difference.
Tadic, quickly conceded defeat congratulating Nikolic on "a fair and well-earned victory".
Nikolic, 60, promised to steer a pro-European course.
"Serbia will not turn away from the European path," he said.
"These elections were not about who will take Serbia to the EU, but who will solve the economic problems created by the Democratic Party" of Boris Tadic, Nikolic added.
However the recent convert to the European cause has warned in the past he would not join the 27-member bloc at any cost.
"This is a turning point for Serbia", he said.
Surveys conducted just ahead of the second round had projected that Democratic Party leader Tadic would win comfortably with up to 58 percent of the vote.
Tadic, 54, who brought the once international pariah state to the European Union's doorstep with candidacy status in March, had pitched his bid for a third term in office as a referendum on pursuing EU membership.
"This was an electoral earthquake, a totally unexpected result," political analyst Slobodan Antonic said on Serbia's RTS state television.
"This will definitely change things in Serbia," he said.
While the ruling parties did well in parliamentary elections two weeks ago "maybe voters now decided it was the time to punish them a bit," he said.
Other analysts blamed the low turnout of 46.86 percent of voters and the high number of invalid votes at some 3 percent for the upset.
"Estimates show that some 30,000 invalid votes, combined with a low turnout have given Nikolic a victory over Tadic," Srdjan Bogosavljevic of the Strategic Marketing pollsters told Beta news agency.
"Only citizens who want change came out to vote," he added.
Nikolic supporters gathered in central Belgrade Sunday, honking their horns in celebration.
During this election campaign Nikolic, who lost to Tadic in 2004 and 2008, tapped into voter discontent over the worsening economic situation in Serbia, which has one of the highest jobless rates in Europe at 24 percent.
"Serbia must develop its economy, we have to get rid of poverty, we must start working, get rid of crime and corruption, we have to get rid of party oligarchies," he said Sunday.
Nikolic, who once served as a deputy prime minister under Milosevic, began a transformation from an ultranationalist to a pro-EU populist in 2008 in founding his Serbian Progressive Party.
He dropped much of his previous party's hardline positions while keeping his populist rhetoric.
He had previously made breakaway Kosovo the red line for EU membership.
Although Kosovo -- the southern majority-ethnic-Albanian province that proclaimed independence in 2008 with EU and US approval -- was once a key issue for Nikolic, he dropped it from the current campaign.
However, after his victory he said the vote showed Serbia "will protect its people in Kosovo".