Mirko Čikiriz () is a Serbian politician. He has served three terms in the National Assembly of Serbia, been a state secretary in the Serbian government, and been an assistant mayor of Kragujevac.
At one time a prominent member of the Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO), Čikiriz joined the breakaway Movement for the Restoration of the Kingdom of Serbia (POKS) in 2017. That organization split in late 2021, and he became a prominent figure in a party faction led by Žika Gojković. Gojković's POKS group ceased to exist in 2022, and the following year Čikiriz launched a local political movement called Kragujevac the Capital–Serbia the Kingdom."Покрет 'Крагујевац престоница – Србија краљевина' се ограђује од поступака ПОКС-а", Radio Televisija Kragujevac, 7 October 2023, accessed 10 May 2024.
Early life and career Čikiriz was born in the small town of Guča, Lučani, in what was then the People's Republic of Serbia in the People's Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. He graduated from the University of Kragujevac Faculty of Law in 1988, passed the bar exam in 1995, and afterward worked at law in Kragujevac. From 1998 to 2008, he was the legal representative and head of the legal service for Takovo osiguranje in the city.MIRKO ČIKIRIZ, Otvoreni Parlament, accessed 19 August 2020.
Politician Serbian Renewal Movement Čikiriz's family has a long history of involvement in Serbian royalist politics. His ancestors were supporters of the Karađorđević dynasty in the nineteenth century, and for twenty days during World War II Draža Mihailović kept his military headquarters in the house of Čikiriz's grandmother. Several members of Čikiriz's family were shot by German forces during the Axis occupation of Serbia.
Čikiriz joined the SPO on its formation in 1990. He was arrested along with party leader Vuk Drašković following street protests against Slobodan Milošević's administration in June 1993; on his release, he organized further protests for the benefit of those party members still incarcerated. Čikiriz became a member of the SPO Kragujevac city board in 1996, and in 1997–98 he was secretary of the municipal assembly and municipal administration in nearby Lapovo. He later became president of the SPO's Kragujevac board and a member of its presidency for the Šumadija District.Lidja Valtner, "Hortikultura i gospodstvo", Danas, 8 March 2009, accessed 5 March 2022.MIRKO ČIKIRIZ, Otvoreni Parlament, accessed 19 August 2020.
He was a candidate in the Serbian parliamentary elections of 2000,Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 23. децембра 2000. године и 10. јануара 2001. године – ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (2 „Српски покрет обнове – Вук Драшковић" – Вук Драшковић), , Republic Election Commission, Republic of Serbia, accessed 7 April 2024. He received the 245th position out of 250 on the list, which was mostly alphabetical. 2003,Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 28. децембра 2003. године – ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (6. СРПСКИ ПОКРЕТ ОБНОВЕ - НОВА СРБИЈА - ВУК ДРАШКОВИЋ - ВЕЛИМИР ИЛИЋ), , Republic Election Commission, Republic of Serbia, accessed 7 April 2024. He received the 114th position in 2003. and 2007,Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 21. јануара и 8. фебрауара 2007. године – ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (7 Српски покрет обнове - Вук Драшковић), , Republic Election Commission, Republic of Serbia, accessed 7 April 2024. He received the fifth position on the list in 2007. although he was not elected on any of these occasions. The SPO's electoral list did not cross the electoral threshold in 2000 or 2007. In 2003, the party ran in an alliance with New Serbia (NS) that won twenty-two seats. Čikiriz appeared in the 114th position on the combined list of the parties and was not given a mandate afterward. (From 2000 to 2011, assembly mandates were awarded to sponsoring parties or coalitions rather than to individual candidates, and it was common practice for the mandates to be assigned out of numerical order. Čikiriz could have been included in the SPO's delegation despite his low position on the list, but ultimately he was not.)Serbia's Law on the Election of Representatives (2000) stipulated that parliamentary mandates would be awarded to electoral lists (Article 80) that crossed the electoral threshold (Article 81), that mandates would be given to candidates appearing on the relevant lists (Article 83), and that the submitters of the lists were responsible for selecting their parliamentary delegations within ten days of the final results being published (Article 84). See Law on the Election of Representatives, Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia, No. 35/2000, made available via LegislationOnline, , accessed 6 June 2021.
Parliamentarian The SPO contested the 2008 Serbian parliamentary election as part of the For a European Serbia (ZES) alliance led by the Democratic Party (DS). Čikiriz was included on the alliance's (mostly alphabetical) list in the 242nd position and was given a mandate when ZES won a plurality victory with 102 seats out of 250.Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 11. маја 2008. године – ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (1 ЗА ЕВРОПСКУ СРБИЈУ – БОРИС ТАДИЋ), , Republic Election Commission, Republic of Serbia, accessed 7 April 2024.11 June 2008 legislature, National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, accessed 18 August 2020. The overall results of the election were inconclusive, but ZES ultimately formed a coalition government with the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS), and the SPO supported the administration. In his first assembly term, Čikiriz was a member of the legislative committee; a deputy member of the committee on youth and sports, the committee for relations with Serbs outside Serbia, and the poverty reduction committee; and a member of the parliamentary friendship groups with Australia, Belgium, Norway, and Portugal.МИРКО ЧИКИРИЗ, , National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, 29 December 2011, accessed 5 March 2022.
Čikiriz was also elected to the Kragujevac city assembly on the ZES alliance's list in the 2008 Serbian local elections.Službeni List (Grada Kragujevca), Volume 18 Number 12 (30 April 2008), p. 3.Službeni List (Grada Kragujevca), Volume 18 Number 16 (27 May 2008), p. 13. The list won fourteen mandates.For the 2008 local elections, all mandates were assigned to candidates on successful lists at the discretion of the sponsoring parties or coalitions. See Law on Local Elections (2007), , Official Gazette of the Republic of Serbia, No. 35/2000; made available via LegislationOnline, , accessed 7 April 2024. His term was brief; he resigned from the city assembly on 10 October 2008.Službeni List (Grada Kragujevca), Volume 28 Number 29 (10 October 2008), p. 11.
Serbia's electoral system was reformed in 2011, such that all mandates were awarded to candidates on successful lists in numerical order.Law on the Election of Members of the Parliament (2000, as amended 2011) (Articles 88 & 92) made available via LegislationOnline, , accessed 6 June 2021. The SPO contested the 2012 Serbian parliamentary election in an alliance with the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) known as U-Turn (Preokret). Čikiriz received the seventeenth position on the alliance's list and was re-elected when it won nineteen seats.Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине, 6. мај 2012. године – ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (4 ЧЕДОМИР ЈОВАНОВИЋ - ПРЕОКРЕТ Либерално демократска партија, Српски покрет обнове, Социјалдемократска унија, Богата Србија, Војвођанска партија, Демократска партија Санџака, Зелена еколошка партија - зелени, Партија Бугара Србије), , Republic Election Commission, Republic of Serbia, accessed 10 July 2021. The Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) won the election and afterward formed a new coalition government with the SPS and other parties, and the SPO served in opposition. Čikiriz was a member of the committee on constitutional affairs and legislation and the committee on the rights of the child, a deputy member of the finance committee and the administrative committee, and a member of the friendship groups with Japan, Slovenia, South Korea, and the Sovereign Order of Malta.MIRKO ČIKIRIZ, , National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, 3 March 2013, accessed 5 March 2022.
The SPO joined the SNS's political alliance in the buildup to the 2014 parliamentary election. Čikiriz received the ninety-second position on the alliance's Aleksandar Vučić—Future We Believe In list and was elected to a third term when the alliance won a landslide victory with 158 seats.Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 16. и 23. марта 2014. године – ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (1 АЛЕКСАНДАР ВУЧИЋ - БУДУЋНОСТ У КОЈУ ВЕРУЈЕМО (Српска напредна странка, Социјалдемократска партија Србије, Нова Србија, Српски покрет обнове, Покрет социјалиста)), , Republic Election Commission, Republic of Serbia, accessed 7 April 2024. In the 2014–16 term, Čikiriz was a member of the committee on constitutional affairs and legislation and the committee on the rights of the child; a deputy member of the administrative committee, the committee for Kosovo and Metohija, the health and family committee, the committee on defence and internal affairs, and the finance committee; a deputy member of Serbia's delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE PA); and a member of the friendship groups with Australia, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Italy, Japan, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, and the United States of America.MIRKO ČIKIRIZ, , National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, 14 April 2014, accessed 5 March 2022.
He received the 134th position on the SNS-led Aleksandar Vučić–Serbia Is Winning list in the 2016 parliamentary electionИзбори за народне посланике Народне скупштине, 24. април 2016. године – Изборне листе (1 АЛЕКСАНДАР ВУЧИЋ - СРБИЈА ПОБЕЂУЈЕ), , Republic Election Commission, Republic of Serbia, accessed 7 April 2024. and narrowly missed re-election when the list won 131 mandates. He was later appointed as a state secretary in Serbia's ministry of justice."Čikiriz: Traži se rešenje za probleme u procesu sudskog veštačenja", Blic (Source: Tanjug), 18 September 2018, accessed 18 August 2020. As none of the SPO's three elected members left the assembly prior to the 2020 election, Čikiriz did not have the opportunity to return as a replacement.
Čikiriz was a vice-president of the SPO at the time that he left the party in 2017."Predsedništvo SPO odbacilo zahtev za promenu rukovodstva stranke", Beta, 27 May 2017, accessed 18 August 2020.
Movement for the Restoration of the Kingdom of Serbia The SPO split in 2017, and a new party called the Movement for the Restoration of the Kingdom of Serbia (POKS) was established under Žika Gojković's leadership. Čikiriz joined the POKS, saying that its founders were dissatisfied with Vuk Drašković's continued leadership of SPO but did not want to attempt a disruptive takeover of that party. In leaving the SPO, Čikiriz accused Drašković of singling out the crimes committed by Serb forces in the Yugoslav Wars of the 1990s and ignoring the crimes of other sides."Čikiriz: Nismo za politicko oceubistvo, osnivamo svoj pokret", Blic (Source: Tanjug), 6 June 2017, accessed 18 August 2020. The POKS initially continued to support Serbia's SNS-led administration, and Čikiriz remained in his role as a state secretary.
In 2019, the Kragujevac city assembly voted to name an alley after Draža Mihailović. Čikiriz supported this decision, describing both Mihailović's Chetniks and the Yugoslav Partisans as having been anti-fascist forces in World War II.Бране Карталовић, "Рат „четника” и „партизана” у Крагујевцу", Politika, 16 November 2019, accessed 19 August 2020.