House of Peoples: Šućur and Kojović Block Election of FBiH Vice President from Serb People

A session of the House of Peoples of the FBiH Parliament is scheduled for Thursday, January 22, where the election of the leadership of this house should be finalized (the Vice-President from the Serb people is missing), and the President and two Vice-Presidents of the Federation of BiH should be elected, writes the Patria News Agency.

As of today, when the session of the Central Election Commission of BiH was held, proposals, i.e., names of candidates for these positions in the executive branch, have not yet been received.

If this does not happen in the next two days, as Patria learns, there is a possibility that the session of the House of Peoples of the FBiH will be postponed until political agreement is reached on the names of candidates for these positions.

So far, HDZBiH has proposed Marinko Čavara from the Croat people for the President of FBiH, and SDA Melika Mahmutbegović for the Vice-President from the Bosniak people.

The Serb Club did not reach an agreement at last week's session regarding the name of the candidate for the position of the second Vice-President of the House of Peoples, nor for the Vice-President of FBiH from the Serb people.

The Democratic Front proposed Slobodan Šoja, a former ambassador of BiH to several countries, as a non-partisan candidate for this position.

However, disagreements arose within the Serb Club, and Šoja, even without a vote, and despite no one having concrete objections, did not secure a sufficient number of votes.

Slaviša Šućur (SDP) was the first to problematize Šoja's appointment, followed by Predrag Kojović (Our Party). According to Patria's source, their arguments for why they "don't like" Šoja were highly questionable, as it ultimately came down to them not knowing why they were against the DF's proposal.

Without the election of the President and Vice-Presidents of FBiH, there will be no election of the new Government, and by all accounts, this matter will only be resolved after the President of SDP, Nermin Nikšić, returns to the country.