Smoke Signals and Smoke Screens

What is really hidden and what can be hidden behind a smoke signal and a smoke screen? Can at least part of the answer to this question be inferred from the statements made at the February meeting of the unholy trinity held in the building of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, after which all those present highlighted their / national priorities in an optimistic tone. Almost unanimously, they pointed out that the goal is „to complete the formation of the government(?) as soon as possible, i.e., to appoint a mandate holder for the Council of Ministers“ and, to use the current momentum in the week when the filling of the House of Peoples of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the state House of Peoples is expected. DČ, they say, was optimistic and saw no reason to prolong the formation of the Council of Ministers, and immediately after that, the distribution and announcement of the names of future ministers. MD was also optimistic... he, with 9 deputies in the House of Representatives and 5 in the House of Peoples, saw no obstacles to forming a government at the state level, and had nothing against a Serb being the chairman of the Council of Ministers, even if it were a certain ZT, known for his unpopular nickname and very inventive methods, especially applicable in the domain of borrowing from foreign financial institutions and taking out loans, and even more inventive ways of hiding the paths, methods and spheres of their spending. However, he problematized mass employment(!), pointing out that from the elections until that day in February, more than 400 people had been employed in state institutions, and the placement of former officials was, in his opinion, a (mis)deed, unfair and illegal by the old structures(?!). BI also addressed the media, saying that today they talked about priorities, relations, building the country, the position of Bosniaks and Croats and the RS, and the position of Serbs in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and improving the atmosphere, but they did not go into details(?!).

In the meantime, the Central Election Commission of Bosnia and Herzegovina, at a session held shortly after that meeting, just a few days ago, adopted a Decision on determining the results of indirect elections and the allocation of mandates in the House of Peoples of the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina from the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. For the most part, these are persons previously known... to various bodies. Among others, people entered the House of Peoples of Bosnia and Herzegovina, one of the most important and significant state institutions, whom no sensible person would entrust with managing – nor have they ever managed – a local community and deciding on the selection of the best-kept flower bed and the most orderly row of onions in the vegetable garden, but for decades they have been deciding on life and death in Bosnia and Herzegovina. We will not split hairs and refer to the aforementioned remark about the placement of former officials.

On the other hand, could it be that the latest triumphantly announced witch hunt, the chase for fake diplomas, has created yet another in a whole series of smoke screens behind and under which all past and future negative findings of audit commissions about collective fanciful, ingenious and impermissible ways of spending budget money, then individual and significantly less fanciful – I would say quite primitive – frauds with travel orders and cars with inappropriate license plates, will slip through, diverting attention from ongoing court proceedings but also further disciplining the party-voter base ahead of the 2020 municipal elections and, perhaps most importantly, legalizing the settling of scores with political, ideological, party and all other dissenters? The accumulated negative experience with the inventors and implementers of various ways, types and methods for reaching and staying in power supports the suspicion that it is not at all excluded that this potentially noble plan could easily – too easily – be turned into its substantive opposite. 

I would not go into technicalities, who will and how, by what criteria and with whose authorizations will carry out checks, and I would not go into whether anyone is or will check the checkers... I would not even predict the results, although I suspect them... but that's another matter, we will hear and see. 

For who knows how many times, I mention, state, point out that there is no domain or sphere of living, no way, method or path, no positive, noble activity conceived with the best intention that in Bosnia and Herzegovina has not experienced its realization opposite and has not been used for settling scores with dissenters, disciplining the disobedient and, most often, soiling the reputation and destroying the lives of those, the blackest sheep. No matter how many are found, whatever the results of the search, what will pass into oblivion under and behind them, even if temporarily, is incomparably more important. In other words, I do not want to believe that this latest witch hunt is more pressing, more essential, more important... whatever, than judicial and public administration reform, the fight against systematic corruption and systemic kleptocracy, determining the origin of the property of elected officials, prosecuting thieves and confiscating illegally acquired property and property originating from criminal acts, determining and prosecuting abuse of position and authority, introducing casinos into the tax system, cleaning up party, political and all other ranks of people who not only disfigure the faces of those parties but bring various stigmas to entire nations that identify with them... I do not want to believe that three, four, or even three hundred or four hundred diplomas are more important than determining who actually killed two young men, one in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and one in the RS.