Bosnian Serb Parliament Blocks Election Co-operation with IFES

The RS parliament has rejected a memorandum of co-operation with the US-based International Foundation for Electoral Systems, IFES, concerning the coming local elections, after the Bosnian Serb supremo Milorad Dodik claimed it would skew the results to serve American interests.

A Bosnian man casts a vote in the country’s general election in 2018. Photo: EPA/Fehim Demir

Acting on the request of Milorad Dodik, Serbian member of the Bosnian state presidency, the Bosnian Serb parliament on Monday rejected a memorandum of co-operation between Bosnia and the US-based International Foundation for Electoral Systems, IFES, which had offered Bosnia assistance in preparing and conducting the local elections due on November 15.

The state presidency adopted a memorandum of understanding between the Bosnian Central Election Commission, CIK, and IFES on August 28. But Dodik rejected it, arguing that it was interference in Bosnia’s internal affairs and a derogation from the powers of Bosnian authorities and entities.

For the proposed memorandum of cooperation to be finally rejected, however, Dodik needed the support of the Republika Srpska assembly, and to get it, he claimed the IFES intended to jeopardize the regularity of the election process by conducting the polls in “American interests”.

“The US administration is trying to take control of the conduct of the elections and thus bring to power parties and politicians who are accountable to Washington,” Dodik insisted to RS lawmakers.

His claim is that the main goal of IFES is to adjust the electoral system to disqualify candidates who do not suit Washington in the 2022 general elections, and bring in others.

Opposition parties in the RS parliament accused Dodik of playing a political game. “IFES has been operating in Bosnia for 20 years, and it is exclusively about [offering] technical support to the authorities to prevent election theft,” Mirko Sarovic, head of the opposition Serbian Democratic Party, SDS, said.

“You are most responsible for thefts and abuses in the election process,” Sarovic told Dodik, accusing him of blocking improvements to the electoral system because a corrupt system suited him.

Branislav Borenovic, leader of the opposition Party of Democratic Progress, PDP, said Dodik needed and has promoted permanent tension and retrograde policies of conflict, insults and harassment.

Ahead of the session of the RS parliament, the CIK recalled that the country has cooperated with IFES for several years.

“From 2017 to March this year, various forms of cooperation between IFES and the CIK were realized. This has never been made a problem so far. IFES cooperates with as many as 145 countries,” Vanja Bjelica Prutina, the president of the CIK, said at a session of that institution after Dodik announced he would initiate a vote citing the constitutional clause on matters that concern a vital entity interest.

Vehid Sehic, a former member of the CEC and a current member of Coalition Under the Spotlight, an NGO which monitors elections, said the IFES remains the most credible organization in the world dealing with the election process.

“We need the experience of IFES to reduce the financing of political parties to legal ones, and get out of the ‘grey’ [unofficial] framework,” Sehic told the Bosnian daily Oslobodjenje.

Every election in Bosnia has been accompanied by a large number of complaints of irregularities, although international and domestic observers have so far assessed that the elections were largely held in a democratic and fair atmosphere. The general assessment of all political parties in Bosnia is that the electoral process needs to be improved.