Aleksandar Vucic, the head of state and the ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), agreed on Monday with Aleksandar Sapic, the nationalist SPAS (Salvation) movement president, to unite in one organisation.

The move was announced earlier and triggered a series of attacks on Sapic, former water polo player, a long-time head of the New Belgrade municipality and the founder of the Budi Human (Be Humane) humanitarian organisation.

Neither Vucic nor Sapic talked to reporters after an hour-long meeting participated by other officials of both parties in the SNS headquarters.

Sapic earlier said the idea came from Vucic and that that was a logical move since his politics was not different from that of SNS.

An SNS deputy leader Milos Vucevic said Monday’s agenda included concrete issues of the unification process.

He added that no positions Sapic and his movement could get were discussed.

“A final decision will be brought at the SNS Main Board meeting on May 29,” Vucevic told the Belgrade Prva TV.

Sapic, once seen as an opposition politician,  had earlier complained about the pressure he and his movement were exposed to from the regime.

He had claimed never to cooperate with SNS.

However, he disagreed with the main opposition parties, which boycotted the 2020 general vote claiming unfair conditions and took advantage of the threshold reduced from five to three percent to enter the parliament, getting 4.2 percent of support.

The public has often mocked Sapic for the lack of education, and his PhD was challenged as plagiarism, which he denied.