Bosnians Fail to Agree Sejdic-Finci Changes

Leaders of Bosnia’s six main parties have failed to reach agreement on ways to implement a 2009 European Court of Human Rights ruling.

The mandate of a parliamentary commission tasked with amending the constitution to meet the court ruling ran out on March 12, which was the deadline set for lawmakers and political parties to agree on a solution.

But after a meeting in Banja Luka on Friday night, politicians said they did not want only a partial solution of the Sejdic-Finci case.

The Strasbourg court ruling, brought by a Jew and a Roma, called on Bosnia to change its constitution to allow ethnic minorities, as well as Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats, to compete for high public offices including the state presidency and the state parliament.

The host of the meeting in Banja Luka, the Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik, president of the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats, SNSD, said they would have to talk again about the Sejdic-Finci ruling in future.

“There are possible ways to solve the problem but we did not want a partial solution so we’ve decided to do it comprehensively,” he said.

Two aspects of a possible solution to the implementation of the Sejdic-Finci ruling have been discussed so far: extending the number of delegates to the House of the Peoples and electing members of the tripartite state presidency in a new way. 

When it comes to the House of the Peoples, there is broad agreement that three more delegates could be included in order to represent ethnic minorities.

But when it comes to the Presidency, the six party leaders have not been able to agree on whether the three Presidency members should be chosen through direct elections or indirectly by parliament.

Under Bosnia’s current constitution and electoral law, all three members of the Presidency are chosen directly – a Serb from Republika Srpska, and a Bosniak and a Croat from the Federation entity.

This means that, apart from ethnic minorities, Serbs from the Federation and Bosniaks and Croats from Republika Srpska cannot run for the state presidency.

Another deadline expires on March 15. This was set by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, PACE, at its January session.

PACE said that if no progress was made on issues including the Sejdic-Finci ruling, it would considerfurther action at its April session, on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of Bosnia’s accession to the Council of Europe.

However, some Bosnian leaders say they will not be hurried by external deadlines.

The leader of the Serbian Democratic Party, SDS, Mladen Bosic, said that it was more important to reach an agreement that was in the interest of the citizens of Bosnia than to satisfy the interests of “someone in Brussels or Chicago”.