When imposing technical changes to the Election Law of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), High Representative Christian Schmidt sent a message to party leaders: “I expect you with ideas in August and September.” Everything indicates that if there is no agreement, Schmidt will also impose the political segment of changes to the electoral law.
For now, party leaders do not mention or even talk about possible meetings on this topic. Everyone is busy with the pre-election campaign and the chances of local political representatives meeting at the same table on this topic in the next month and a half are minimal.
In the current circumstances, this represents greater pressure on the parties based in Sarajevo. Why? For the simple reason that the High Representative has made it clear through the previous actions that he is ready to intervene and impose changes in the law. And that imposition would go in a direction that HDZ is much more satisfied with than all the parties based in Sarajevo.
The draft that was published earlier revealed in which direction Schmidt could go, regardless of whether he would change some segments in terms of introducing a census for the election of cantonal delegates to the federal House of Peoples. This currently gives the HDZ a slightly more comfortable position, and they do not necessarily have to insist on the last round of negotiations.
Nevertheless, strong calls for compromise and a final agreement should not be rejected, but it is necessary to define where and to what extent it is necessary to seek space for agreement. And that space could only be sought on the question of the powers of the House of Peoples of Federation of BiH (FBiH). If the parties could agree on reducing the powers of this legislative body, then we could talk about a final solution and the fulfillment of certain demands of the Croats, as well as the parties from Sarajevo.
The requests that went in the direction of reducing the powers of the House of Peoples of FBiH were mainly based on defining a list of what is a vital national interest and reducing that body to deciding on a vital interest. Until now, HDZ has not shown its willingness to reduce the House of Peoples, and this was also rejected at the negotiations in Neum.
However, the powers of the House of Peoples are the only field where the HDZ can expect the readiness of the parties from Sarajevo to find an agreement. At least that is what the political messages sent from Sarajevo in the previous period suggest.
It should be pointed out that in the Republika Srpska (RS) entity, exactly such a system has been established, given that the Council of Peoples is in charge and has the authority exclusively to discuss the protection of the vital national interest. All other issues and laws are considered adopted by their adoption in the National Assembly of the RS (NARS).
