Gordana Čomić (; born 16 June 1958) is a Serbian politician. She was a member of the Serbian parliament from 2001 to 2020 and was Serbia's minister for human and minority rights and social dialogue from 2020 to 2022. A long-time member of the Democratic Party (DS), she was excluded from the party in 2020 after openly opposing its boycott of the 2020 Serbian parliamentary election."Чомић обавештена да је избрисана из чланства у ДС", Politika, 15 May 2020, accessed 18 June 2020.
Early life and career Čomić was born in Novi Sad, Vojvodina, in what was then the People's Republic of Serbia in the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia. She trained as a physicist and was employed at the University of Novi Sad's Faculty of Technical Sciences from 1984 to 1999. From 1999 to 2004, she worked in marketing for SPC Vojvodina.Gordana Comic, , National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, accessed 20 May 2022.
Čomić was one of the first Serbian politicians to write a blog, starting in 2006."Serbian expert says parties unaware of potential of internet, social networking," British Broadcasting Corporation Monitoring European, 27 May 2010 (Source: Danas website, Belgrade, in Serbian 26 May 10); "Serbian politicians turn to Twitter to express views without "censorship"- paper," British Broadcasting Corporation Monitoring European, 31 January 2012 (Source: Vecernje novosti website, Belgrade, in Serbian 23 Jan 12).
Politician Early years (1992–2001) Čomić joined the Democratic Party's Novi Sad municipal board in 1992 and afterward became a party spokesperson at the city and provincial levels. She led the DS's Novi Sad election headquarters in 1996 and was president of its Vojvodina provincial board in from 1998 to 2001.Gordana Comic, , National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, accessed 20 May 2022.
Čomić appeared on the Democratic Party's electoral lists for the Novi Sad division in the 1992 and 1993 Serbian parliamentary elections, although she did not receive an assembly mandate on either occasion.The Democratic Party ran in an alliance with the Reformist Democratic Party of Vojvodina in Novi Sad for the 1992 election. Čomić received the twenty-fourth position on the alliance's electoral list; the list won two seats. See Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 20. и 27. децембра 1992. године и 3. јануара 1993. године – ЗБИРНЕ ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (6 Нови Сад) and Извештај о укупним резултатима избора за народне посланике у Народну скупштину Републике Србије, одржаних 20. и 27. децембра 1992. године и 3. јануара 1993. године, , Republic Election Commission, Republic of Serbia, accessed 7 February 2024. In 1993, Čomić received the seventh position on the Democratic Party's list; the list won four seats. See Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 19. и 26. децембра 1993. године и 5. јануара 1994. године – ЗБИРНЕ ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (6 Нови Сад) and Извештај о укупним резултатима избора за народне посланике у Народну скупштину Републике Србије, одржаних 19. и 26. децембра 1993. године и 5. јануара 1994. године, , Republic Election Commission, Republic of Serbia, accessed 7 February 2024. (From 1992 to 2000, Serbia's electoral law stipulated that one-third of parliamentary mandates would be assigned to candidates on successful lists in numerical order while the remaining two-thirds would be distributed amongst other candidates at the discretion of sponsoring parties or coalitions. Čomić did not have a high enough list position in either 1992 or 1993 to receive an automatic mandate, nor was she granted an optional mandate afterwards.)Guide to the Early Election , Ministry of Information of the Republic of Serbia, December 1992, made available by the International Foundation for Electoral Systems, accessed 14 July 2017.Službeni Glasnik (Republike Srbije), Volume 49 Number 7 (25 January 1993), pp. 193–194.Službeni Glasnik (Republike Srbije), Volume 50 Number 11 (25 January 1994), p. 193.
The DS contested the 1996 Yugoslavian parliamentary election as part of the Zajedno (English: Together) coalition, and Čomić appeared in the lead position on its electoral list for Zrenjanin.Srpska reč, Volume 161, 17 October 1996, p. 23. The list did not cross the electoral threshold to win any seats in the division.ИЗБОРИ '96: ВЕЋЕ ГРАЂАНА САВЕЗНЕ СКУПШТИНЕ, Federal Republic of Yugoslavia Department of Statistics (1996), p. 40. Čomić was, however, elected to the Vojvodina provincial assembly for Novi Sad's thirteenth division in the concurrent 1996 provincial election.Извештај о укупним резултатима избора за посланике у Скупштину Аутономне Покрајине Војводине одржаних 3. и 17. новембра 1996. године , Provincial Election Commission, Autonomous Province of Vojvodina, Republic of Serbia, accessed 1 April 2023. The Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) won a majority victory at the provincial level, and Čomić led the Zajedno opposition group in the assembly from 1997 to 2000. At the local level, she was a member of Novi Sad's executive committee in 1997, after Zajedno'''s victory in the city in the 1996 Serbian local elections.Gordana Comic, , National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, accessed 20 May 2022.
In 2000, the DS became one of the main parties in the Democratic Opposition of Serbia (DOS), a broad and ideologically diverse coalition of parties opposed to Slobodan Milošević's authoritarian rule. DOS candidate Vojislav Koštunica defeated Milošević in the 2000 Yugoslavian presidential election, which led to Milošević's fall from power and prompted widespread changes in the political culture of Serbia and Yugoslavia. Čomić was re-elected for Novi Sad's tenth division in the 2000 Vojvodina provincial election, which took place concurrently with the presidential vote. The DOS won a landslide victory provincially, and Čomić served as a deputy speaker of the Vojvodina assembly from 2000 to 2001.Извештај о укупним резултатима избора за посланике у Скупштину Аутономне Покрајине Војводине одржаних 24. септембра и 8. октобра 2000. године , Provincial Election Commission, Autonomous Province of Vojvodina, Republic of Serbia, accessed 1 April 2023. She also appeared on the DOS's electoral list for the Yugoslavian Chamber of Republics in 2000, although she did not receive a mandate to serve in that legislature.Čomić received the eighteenth position out of twenty on the DOS's list. The alliance won ten seats. For this election, half of the mandates were awarded in numerical order with the other half assigned at the discretion of the sponsoring parties or coalitions; Čomić once again did not receive an automatic mandate and was not chosen for an optional mandate. See Izborna lista za Veće republika Savezne skupštine – Demokratske opozicije Srbije, , Democratic Opposition of Serbia, 17 October 2000, accessed 24 June 2022; and "Ko su poslanici" , Vreme, 28 September 2000, accessed 10 November 2021.
Parliamentarian 2001–12 Serbia's government fell after Milošević's defeat in the Yugoslavian election, and a new Serbian parliamentary election was called for December 2000. Serbia's electoral system was reformed prior to the vote, such that the entire country became a single at-large electoral division and all assembly mandates were assigned to candidates on successful lists at the discretion of the sponsoring parties or coalitions, irrespective of numerical order.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. Čomić received the twenty-first position on the DOS's electoral list.Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 23. децембра 2000. године и 10. јануара 2001. године – ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (4 Демократска опозиција Србије – др Војислав Коштуница (Демократска странка, Демократска странка Србије, Социјалдемократија, Грађански савез Србије, Демохришћанска странка Србије, Нова Србија, Покрет за демократску Србију, Лига социјалдемократа Војводине, Реформска демократска странка Војводине, Коалиција Војводина, Савез војвођанских Мађара, Демократска алтернатива, Демократски центар, Нова демократија, Социјалдемократска унија, Санxачка демократска партија, Лига за Шумадију, Српски покрет отпора – Демократски покрет), , Republic Election Commission, Republic of Serbia, accessed 7 April 2024. The list won a landslide majority victory with 176 out of 250 mandates, and she was included in the DS's delegation when the new assembly convened in January 2001.PRVA KONSTITUTIVNA SEDNICA, 22.01.2001., Otvoreni Parlament, 11 January 2001, accessed 18 July 2021. She became a party vice-president later in the year and served as a deputy speaker of the assembly.Gordana Comic, , National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia, accessed 20 May 2022.
In October 2003, Čomić controversially delayed a vote of no-confidence in the government of Zoran Živković, prompting some opposition members to charge that the delay was a method to give the government more time to build a working majority.Misha Savic, "Serbian government under threat of no-confidence vote, possible early elections," Associated Press Newswires, 14 October 2003. Speaker Nataša Mićić ultimately dissolved the assembly for new elections on 13 November 2003. The Democratic Party contested the resulting 2003 parliamentary election at the head of its own alliance, and Čomić received the sixth position on its electoral list.Избори за народне посланике Народне скупштине одржани 28. децембра 2003. године – ИЗБОРНЕ ЛИСТЕ (5. ДЕМОКРАТСКА СТРАНКА – БОРИС ТАДИЋ), , Republic Election Commission, Republic of Serbia, accessed 7 April 2024. The list won thirty-seven seats, and she was again included in the DS's assembly delegation."Podrška neoročenoj vladi", , Glas javnosti, 15 January 2004, accessed 13 March 2024. The rival Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS) formed a coalition government after the election, and the DS moved into opposition.