Sarajevo, as a model of government action that should be expanded throughout the country, an example of positive processes and synergy in the work within the Coalition of the Three, as these parties often pointed out, today is anything but a “political fairy tale” that has already faded well before the eyes of the citizens of the capital.
Stories about social assistance for expectant mothers as a hit-reform and a new tram line as a capital project have long since been buried by garbage, which in high July temperatures has become more unbearable than winter smog.
False promises
The non-existent parliamentary majority in Canton Sarajevo (CS), which again lacks a hand or two after it was decided to throw SBiH out of power, and introduce a few independent representatives with significant portfolios, is just one of a series of problems of the government in Sarajevo.
Even bigger problems, disagreements, and scandals are present in the local structures of the Coalition of the Three government, which is most evident in the examples of the municipalities of Centar and Novo Sarajevo, which, after the last municipal elections, were known as trophies and symbols of the overthrow of the long-standing SDA Government and the return of true values, even the image of the multi-ethnicity of the capital. Changes, capital projects, construction, and everything that was the expectations of the citizens are invisible at every step.
For example, the mayor of Novo Sarajevo, Hasan Tanovic (SDP), was supported by a campaign of intellectuals, writers, and doctors who recorded videos and eulogies in his honor, all with the aim of demolishing the impregnable fortress. SDA, and the compromised Nedzad Koldza, announced that his first step after taking over the Municipal Audit was to expose the crimes of his predecessor, which he never did. He responded to the massive support of citizens eager for change with arrogance, indifference, and ingratitude.
And just as Tanovic will only be remembered for buying an expensive electric car, Srdjan Mandic (NS), the Mayor of Centar, with tens of millions of unexecuted budget, larger than some cantons have, drew the public’s attention with the famous quasi-project “Sarajevo carpet”, which, due to the millions of dollars it cost, and the citizens’ dissatisfaction with the appearance and purpose of such a sculpture, is already an affair in itself. But what is even more devastating than the Sarajevo mayors who lack the ideas is the fact that their impeachment is sought just over a year before the regular local elections, and in the case of Mandic, behind everything, apparently, is the ambitious son of a high-ranking member of the NiP, Kemal Ademovic, – Jasmin.
Without result
The slow construction of the long-announced thoroughfares, huge traffic jams due to the reconstruction of the tram line, timed in the middle of the tourist season and in the busiest locations, unmaintained grass areas, visible garbage in the city…
Strong cadres of the alternative, without previous work results behind them, in the form of the newly minted Prime Minister Nihad Uk (Our Party), Mayor Benjamina Karic (SDP), as well as ministers and mayors, who were pushed to executive positions by the flood of citizens’ dissatisfaction with the SDA’s long-term rule, based on the image they leave behind, are the best proof of how personnel policy is the secret of all successes and failures, and the mother of all policies.
Uk Prime Minister
The personnel failures and lack of vision at other levels of government in Sarajevo are best illustrated by the recent statement of the Prime Minister of the CS, Nihad Uk, in which he cites the neglect of utility companies and mechanization as the reason for the huge amount of garbage in the city, completely ignoring the fact that the party he comes from has held the position of Prime Minister for almost four years, Avaz reports.
E.Dz.
