Elaboration completed, commission dissolved. This is how the project for the procurement of firefighting aircraft in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH) could be described.
FBiH has been waiting more than 11 years for the acquisition of aircraft.
Without aircraft and a special fire unit, fires are put out “manually” in Herzegovina every year, with the help of firefighters. Last year alone, according to the Civil Protection Administration of the Herzegovina-Neretva Canton (HNC), there were about 2.500 of them.
“Complicated public procurement procedures.” This is how the former Prime Minister of the FBiH, Fadil Novalic, who was Prime Minister for eight years and a member of the SDA, explains the reason for the delay in the procurement of the aircraft.
Why haven’t the aircraft been procured?
The working group for the procurement and rental of aircraft, as well as the establishment of a special FBiH unit for firefighting, was formed at the end of May last year.
The elaboration prepared by that working group was completed shortly before the General Elections in BiH, which were held in October 2022.
The working group’s elaboration provided for the engagement and training of a total of ten pilots.
Moreover, that elaboration stipulated that the air unit would be called the Rescue Agency of the FBiH, whose headquarters were to be in Sarajevo and Mostar, within their respective airports.
One source adds that the entire project of acquiring the aircraft and establishing the unit was in the final phase, but that it was suspended by the previous government of the FBiH.
At the same time, the former president of the working group, Marin Raspudic, explained that, after finishing its work, specifying what is needed to establish a special unit in the FBiH, the working group was dissolved and no longer exists.
“At that presentation in the FBiH Government, we said in which direction we should go, that this unit should be formed immediately, a director should be appointed and given all the authorizations, the procurement and training process should begin, we need two years to train the pilots. And then the Government of the FBiH decided to thank us for our cooperation,” says Raspudic, Radio Slobodna Evropa reports.
E.Dz.
