Year after year, the HJPC Report declines, and no one is held accountable

It is almost the end of 2017, and the House of Representatives of the BiH Parliament will only discuss the Report on the Work of the High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council (HJPC) for 2016 tomorrow, and the President of the HJPC, Milan Tegeltija, will have to attend the session, writes the Patria News Agency.

Otherwise, this will be one of the most interesting agenda items, as it is known that the members of the Constitutional-Legal Commission did not acknowledge the HJPC Report for 2016.

The SDS and NDP voted against the Report, the SBB voted for it, while the members of the Commission from DF, SDA, HDZ, and the Independent Bloc abstained.

Otherwise, Admir Katica, head of President Tegeltija's cabinet, attended the Commission session on behalf of the HJPC. He stated that Tegeltija was unable to attend the Commission session and the session of the House of Representatives on Wednesday due to health problems. Katica explained that the doctor prescribed six weeks of rest for Tegeltija due to a serious injury.

Šefik Džaferović, Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives and a member of the Commission, proposed at the session a conclusion to remove the HJPC Report from the agenda and to consider it when Tegeltija is able to attend the session. This conclusion did not receive the support of the Commission.

Finally, a conclusion by Momčilo Novaković (NDP) was adopted to request the Collegium of the House of Representatives to ensure the presence of the HJPC President at the session of the House of Representatives, with six votes in favor (SDA, SDS, NDP, Independent Bloc, DF, HDZ) and one abstention (SBB).

As is usually the case, MPs engage in a heated debate when it comes to the judiciary. This was also the case during the adoption of the Report on the Work of the HJPC for 2015. It is problematic that the Report contains recommendations from the European Commission that have not been implemented for years, and MPs point out that it is often unclear to them whether they want to be untouchable or independent in the judiciary.

The Report on the Work of the HJPC in 2015, which Milan Tegeltija also defended at the time, was not acknowledged, but there were no consequences for him or this institution. The problems have doubled, so new criticisms of their work, as well as the Law on HJPC, are expected.

It will certainly be interesting to see if Tegeltija will attend the session, as there will be no discussion without his presence.