SERBIA's opposition coalition which won a three-month battle with ruling socialists over control of Belgrade's city council, elected the Democratic Party leader, Mr Zoran Djindjic, as mayor yesterday.
About 150,000 people thronged central Belgrade late into the night to celebrate the end of socialist rule in the Serbian capital and welcome their new mayor.
Mr Djindjic, a smooth, multilingual politician who has travelled Europe pushing the case for the Serbian opposition, was the only candidate and was elected with 68 votes to loud applause in the chamber.
He took over the chair of the assembly session within minutes of the vote being announced, ending the socialists' 50-year grip on power in the city.
The three-party Zajedno (Together) coalition forced President Slobodan Milosevic's socialists to "recognise its gains in local elections held in November with daily street protests, which involved half a million people at their height.
Zajedno called off the protests when the socialists finally agreed to recognise its election victories but leaders say two key goals remain to be met.
They want Mr Milosevic's government to free up the country's heavily-controlled media and create fair conditions for parliamentary and presidential elections due later this year.
The coalition now has the majority in Belgrade with 69 seats out of 110 on the council, though socialists still control both the Serbian and Yugoslav governments.
It faces an uphill struggle in Belgrade, inheriting power in a city that has little money to pay for badly needed reforms and modernisation.
Before the vote, Mr Djindjic told the assembly the two main objectives of the new city government would be to modernise the administration and to make it publicly accountable - giving the public access to revenue and expenditure figures.
"We shall try in principle and in the long term to resolve the problem of Belgrade. We are aware we shall not have the support of other bodies in Serbia but we shall have the support of citizens with whose help we were brought here," he, said.