In the case when politicians do not find a compromise, the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina is not filled, the prosecution does not enforce judgments even though according to the Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina the decisions of the Constitutional Court are final and binding, who will and who can protect the constitutional order?
The constitutional order of BiH should protect the Constitutional Court of BiH and other entity courts, and these courts must be filled, according to experts. They are filled by compromise. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, it is under political pressure and is one of the most difficult issues in BiH political scene.
“It is impossible to bypass the relevant actors from the framework of all three constituent nations. Some actors mention the desirability of abolishing the possibility of veto, it is impossible within the current constitutional order, certain bodies have the right of veto and they use it when they find it appropriate to use it,” Milan Sitarski from the Institute for Socio-Political Research, said.
“Those who were supposed to protect and did protect the constitutional order are the international community and the office of the high representative. Now, more work is being done on transferring responsibility, because as analyst Huskić says, there is no desire for anyone to deal with it,” says political analyst Adnan Huskic.
As international activism in BiH decreased, it was insisted that domestic institutions, through all those reforms we witnessed, reforms of the judiciary among others, transfer the responsibility for the establishment of the rule of law in the country. Of course, that didn’t happen.
Both the Constitutional Court and the prosecution are obliged to protect the constitutional order and have special competences in this regard. The ability to act more quickly on this issue lies with the High Representative.
The High Representative has a broad mandate to act within the protection of the Dayton Agreement and the Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, based on Annex 10 of the Dayton Agreement. When it comes to the protection of the constitutional order, the Constitutional Court acts only in terms of evaluating the constitutionality of laws. The Prosecutor’s Office is competent to act and conduct an investigation if a criminal offense against the constitutional order of Bosnia and Herzegovina has been committed by the actions of several persons.
Let us remind you that the decisions of the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as its existence, are disputed by the Republika Srpska entity, and they also reject the legitimacy of the High Representative Kristijan Šmit. The Constitutional Court is missing a judge from the Federation and one judge from Republika Srpska, another judge from the RS requested early retirement, and replacement judges have not been appointed.
