SARAJEVO – Bosnia and Herzegovina heads to the polls Sunday, with voters in the multi-ethnic Balkan country more concerned about daily economic pressures than political confrontation. Yet some leading politicians continue to revive the war-era divisions that have shaped public life since the devastating 1992-95 conflict.
Voting begins at 7 a.m. local time, when roughly 3.4 million eligible voters will select the three members of Bosnia’s multi-ethnic presidency, representatives to the national Parliament and leaders of key institutions in the country’s two entities: the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Republika Srpska.
That complicated political structure was established under the U.S.-brokered peace accord that brought Bosnia’s war to an end.
Although he is not a candidate, a staunchly pro-Russian politician has overshadowed the campaign. His rhetoric has deepened ethnic divisions and fueled concerns that Bosnia’s political crisis could again threaten regional stability.
Pro-Russian Dodik remains a powerful force despite election ban
Milorad Dodik, the nationalist former president of the Serb-majority Republika Srpska, has been barred from public office after his conviction for refusing to comply with decisions made by the international representative responsible for overseeing implementation of the 1995 peace agreement.
Dodik recently returned from Moscow, where he met Russian President Vladimir Putin. His party, the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats, is widely expected to prevail in the Republika Srpska election.
Speaking Friday night at his party’s final rally in Banja Luka, the administrative center of Republika Srpska, Dodik told supporters that Bosnia “is dead.”
“It is an impossible country. It doesn’t make any sense,” he declared at the event, which was also attended by Russia’s ambassador to Bosnia and Herzegovina, Igor Khalabukov.
Analyst Dragan Bursac said Dodik remains a central figure even though he is not on the ballot for the first time in almost three decades. “He is still in command. He is everywhere,” Bursac said.
Dodik’s presence extends well beyond Republika Srpska, Bursac added, noting that he continues to dominate media coverage throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina. “It is obvious that these measures to ban him from political life are not working, and he is using them,” he said.
Bosnia votes as ethnic and political tensions intensify
Bosnia has remained largely peaceful in recent years, but its political leaders have continued to emphasize the divide between Bosniaks, who are predominantly Muslim, and the country’s Serb and Croat communities. Bosnian Serb leaders, including Dodik, have repeatedly advocated separating Republika Srpska from the rest of Bosnia, prompting Western governments to warn that tensions could escalate again.
The country remains one of Europe’s poorest and is still confronting the long-term consequences of the war that began in 1992, after Bosnia declared independence from the Serb-dominated former Yugoslavia. Bosnian Serbs then took up arms in an effort to establish their own territory and unite it with Serbia.
More than 100,000 people were killed, while millions were forced from their homes.
Bosnia has formally applied to join the European Union, but its path toward membership remains stalled. EU efforts to persuade the country’s divided political leadership to cooperate on reforms have produced limited progress.
Durak Miler, a Sarajevo resident, said before Election Day that the country’s political leadership only worsens public frustration. “They just poison people when they talk,” he said.
“We should change the old faces,” Miler added. “They have been governing for 35 years … I think whoever comes next will work better for retired people and the poor.”
Bosnia’s wartime divisions were brought back into focus recently after Serbia and Bosnian Serbs publicly honored former wartime commander Ratko Mladic. He died in late August while serving a life sentence for genocide and other war crimes.
Many Bosnian Serbs regard Mladic as a hero, despite his conviction by a U.N. tribunal for the 1995 Srebrenica massacre, in which more than 8,000 Muslim men and boys were killed, as well as for other atrocities.
Key Bosnian Serb officials attended the funeral service for Mladic in Belgrade that sparked harsh EU criticism and angered Bosniak politicians.
Electronic election security introduced
In an important change to Bosnia’s elections, authorities for the first time will use electronic identification of voters and scanning of ballots to prevent any irregularities or organized voter manipulation that has cast doubt on the fairness of previous elections.
Salko Bijavica, from the southern town of Mostar, said he is glad that “every vote will be counted,” and that the change will give “hope to people that elections will be fair.”
Most of Bosnia’s 75 political parties running in the election are organized along ethnic lines in the country’s Serb-controlled Republika Srpska and the Bosniak-Croat Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina. The two entities are bound together by the central presidency and Parliament.
The Bosniak nationalist Party of Democratic Action has focused its campaign on efforts to keep Bosnia united against Serb separatism. Bosnian Croats, too, largely support their ethnic parties, including the Bosnian branch of Croatia’s ruling conservative Croatian Democratic Union.
Polls will close at 7 p.m. local time.
Many disillusioned citizens say politicians are using nationalism to avoid solving important problems such as poor living standards and an exodus of youth from the country.
Ivan Silic, from the southern town of Mostar, said: “I don’t see that anything is getting better, from the moment I started to vote.”
“We all know who lives well,” he said. “It is better for (politicians), and for the rest of us everything is the same.”
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