No agreement on Mostar mayor

(Patria) - A meeting of parties that entered the Mostar City Council, initiated and organized by BH Blok, has concluded in Mostar. The participants of the meeting stated that they support talks and negotiations, but no concrete solutions were reached - said Zlatko Guzin, the Coalition for Mostar candidate for mayor. However, it was said that the stance is that the leadership will be elected at the session and they will proceed that way.

“I support sitting down and talking, I expected us to reach concrete solutions,” said Guzin.

Mario Kordić, the HDZ candidate for the same position, speaking about the Statute of the City of Mostar, pointed out that he does not know if it will be adopted, reports N1.

“Legally, there must be a procedure, as far as amendments are concerned – we need to sit down. The Statute we have is in some provisions against the law. When to open that – that is a matter of agreement,” he said, adding that it should not be an obstacle to further progress in finding solutions for Mostar.

Who are the preferred partners for HDZ?

“HDZ’s partners are all elected parties. I said that this is a civilized way and the right path, for all 35 councilors to sit down and discuss Mostar’s issues. I am in favor of open discussions, without putting ourselves into blocs. Enough of that. I expect the support of the city councilors and together we will discuss the issues,” said Kordić.

Irma Baralija, Our Party’s candidate for the position of President of the City Council, said that she is the candidate of that party.

“We had negotiations with partners from BH blok, they will have a party organs session, where decisions will be made, but for now, I am Our Party’s candidate,” she said. Baralija said that it was also agreed not to allow Mostar to be without authority for a long time.

Slaven Bevanda from the Croatian Republican Party said that the clubs of constituent peoples must propose candidates, and in this way, the conditions will be met to elect the leadership of the Mostar City Council.

He did not speak about names, nor was there any discussion about it in the party organs.

“HDZ has the majority, we expect them to propose a name,” he stated, adding that HRS will declare itself on the candidacy or support someone at the session on Wednesday.

“First, the leadership of the City Council is elected. Councilors will propose members, and clubs nominate one member each. It is elected by a single vote. It is not elected as a package. The result can be 15:15:5 – depending on who has the most votes becomes the chairman, the other two vice-chairmen. If the mayor is from the same ethnic group as the chairman of the City Council – then a re-election occurs,” Bevanda explained the procedure.

Arman Zalihić, the leader of the BH bloc list, said that the Statute stipulates that the president and two deputies must be from different constituent peoples, and that someone from the 'others' category cannot be in the collegium. The proposal that SDP will seek is to first adopt the Statute imposed by the High Representative, so that it can be amended.

“I hope it will be adopted by consensus, because it moves in the direction of resolving that everyone has equal rights. I don’t know why anyone would have anything against someone having fewer rights in the Council. Everyone should be equal,” stated Zalihić.

“What we agreed on are the problems of the citizens of Mostar. We have listed 10 theses for which we will seek support for reforms,” said Zalihić.

Regarding the continuation of the meeting – nothing has been officially scheduled, but the mood after this is such that there may be more, the participants stated, adding that parties can talk among themselves.

The first session of the Mostar City Council should be held by Friday, February 5th at the latest, after the Central Election Commission (CIK) of BiH confirmed the official election results in this city and they were published in the Official Gazette on January 22nd.

According to the Statute of the City of Mostar, the first session of the City Council is convened by the oldest councilor, and this time it is Tomislav Primorac, who was elected from the HDZ BiH list.

At the first session, the newly elected councilors will accept their certificates and take an oath.

According to the statute, at the first session of the City Council, the president and two vice-presidents are elected from among the city councilors.