Čović's politics from illegality or how all 'conflicts' in BiH are Bosniak-Serb

By: Edina Latif

The policy led by the member of the BiH Presidency and leader of HDZ BiH, Dragan Čović, is hypocritical and, to put it mildly, slimy. When the application for BiH's EU membership was submitted around this time last year, we saw him on all television stations day after day, reading his statements in newspapers and on portals.

Only because he was the Chairman of the BiH Presidency at the time, he had the opportunity to submit the BiH application in Brussels, rather than, say, Bakir Izetbegović or Mladen Ivanić. And that is not Čović's merit, but that of all institutions and officials who worked on fulfilling the conditions. However, he used every opportunity to emphasize how 'he' had done everything for the application to be submitted.

Now, when the situation on the heated BiH political scene is tense and exposed, Čović is, of course, nowhere to be found.

When the unconstitutional referendum was organized and conducted, the leader of HDZ BiH, after a meeting with his best friend and proven and irreplaceable political partner in 'crimes against BiH', Milorad Dodik, kept saying that the event of September 25 would not significantly affect the political situation in the country.

-The referendum will pass, and the next day no one will mention this topic anymore. The referendum is the most democratic way of expressing the will of a people, Čović told us then.

And a lot has happened from the referendum until today.

Exactly that move, which Čović thought the international community would overlook, 'cost Dodik his head'. It was a path to political suicide.

Not hoping that the US government would impose sanctions on his 'war comrade', Čović decided to help him in two important matters – the formation of BiH Armed Forces members on January 9 in Banja Luka and the drafting of a law on the BiH Constitutional Court that would eliminate foreign judges.

Around January 9, the Chairman of the BiH Presidency, Mladen Ivanić, suddenly took the main role.

He could not bear being called a traitor of the Serbian people, so with the help of Čović's minister Marina Pendeš, generals Jeleč and Tepšić, supported by Bosniak generals who 'dignifiedly remained silent' (except for three Bosniak officers who made it known that the state comes first, as already written), he brought an 'ethnically cleansed' unit of the BiH Armed Forces onto the streets of Banja Luka.

Čović, Dodik, and Ivanić all know that this was a reckless move, but since September 25, when the referendum was conducted, they crossed a red line from which there was no return.

The BiH Prosecutor's Office is conducting investigations into both the referendum and the formation of BiH soldiers. Indictments will certainly be filed, as Dodik himself announced during his visit to Belgrade. What will happen next in the boiling Bosnian pot, even the best political analysts are not ready to estimate.

While all this is happening, Čović is nowhere to be seen. He is not responding.

Except that in January, the HNS convened, sending messages about the inevitability of changes to the Election Law, as well as the federalization of the Federation of BiH, i.e., the creation of a third entity.

And again, Čović retreated into political illegality, from which he sent a message that he is against submitting a request for a review of the judgment in the BiH lawsuit against Serbia. From a 'safe distance' in Mostar, he gave a statement saying he thinks this should not have been done in this way.

-If a revision was wanted, it could have been done in a different way, a systemic way. This way it turned out that it was done by one person, one people, said Čović, who did not clarify why he stepped aside and directly contributed to the issue of the revision, as well as all other political issues, being perceived in the public as a 'conflict between Bosniaks and Serbs'.

Thus, he demonstrated, for who knows how many times, the absence of any empathy for his own people, for the attack on the village of Ravno, which began the aggression against BiH, for the expelled and killed Croats from the territory of Republika Srpska, for the destruction and killings in Posavina... for the detained former members of the HVO whom he did not even visit in detention in Busovača, but he did visit Prlić and the team in Scheveningen.

That European from Mostar, who during the war exploited Bosniak camp inmates from Heliodrom for the needs of Sokol, where he was director, only worries about how to round off his empire.

He played along with Dodik, on the principle of 'you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours'.

I support you in the referendum, then in the formation of the BiH Armed Forces, I will oppose the revision, but I expect your support when the Election Law changes come, when I round off my Croatian nahija, and I won't touch yours.

Politics is a wh... excuse my swearing, Đole sang long ago. Whoever understands will get it; in politics, everything is for sale, everything can be bought, it's just a question of who will offer the right price.

Čović and Dodik certainly know how to trade, both above and below the table. For the difficult political situation, perhaps the most difficult since Dayton until today, in which BiH finds itself, they blame, first between the lines and then directly, Bakir Izetbegović, and they have done everything to create controlled chaos. The revision of the judgment just came to them as an ace in the hole to shift the ball to the 'opponent's field'.