Criminal complaint filed against Minister Hrnjić: Refused to act according to the Law and abused his position

(Patria) - A criminal complaint has been filed with the Sarajevo Cantonal Prosecutor's Office against Kemal Hrnjić, Minister of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Water Management and Forestry, for abusing his official position and thereby committing criminal offenses under Article 383 of the Criminal Code of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Article 351 of the Criminal Code of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The alleged violation of the law is that Kemal Hrnjić proposed to the Government of the Federation of BiH, which the Government accepted and passed Decision No.: 1267/2024 of August 7, 2024, on the appointment of a temporary Management Board of the "Sava River Basin Agency" Sarajevo.

At the same time, he proposed to the Government the dismissal of the then members of the Management Board, in such a way that he "retained" the members of the Management Board from the Croatian people, and replaced the members of the Management Board who were from the Bosniak people, with the explanation that the Management Board had not submitted its work report for the previous year.

The aforementioned Decision on dismissal was appealed by the dismissed members of the Management Board from the Bosniak people (Šalo Dženan, Mujagić Fuad, and Sejdić Safeta) by filing a request for the protection of individual freedoms and rights guaranteed by the Constitution of the Federation of BiH with the Cantonal Court in Sarajevo.

The Cantonal Court in Sarajevo issued Decision No.: 09 0U 047467 24 UZ of September 26, 2024, which granted the request for the protection of individual freedoms and rights guaranteed by the Constitution of the Federation of BiH for the aforementioned persons, and ordered the minister and the Government to take the necessary measures to restore the legal situation for the applicants as it was before the Decision on the dismissal of the Management Board of the "Sava River Basin Agency" Sarajevo No.: 1266/2024 of August 7, 2024, was made.

On the same day (September 30, 2024) that the Decision of the Cantonal Court was received, by which the then Management Board was declared illegal, the Management Board nevertheless made a decision to appoint an acting director of the Agency.

Therefore, an illegal Management Board made an illegal decision and appointed an incompetent person as acting director, who until then was a senior associate in the Agency and had no work experience in management positions, as she had never performed such duties, nor does she have any professional or expert authority in the Agency. The only competence the acting director has is the political support of Minister Hrnjić.

A similar situation exists with the Adriatic Sea Basin Agency. The mandate of the then director expired on October 2, 2024. According to the Water Law, the minister was obliged to give consent to the appointment of the Agency's director, which he did not do, even though he received a request from the Agency's Management Board to consent to Decision No.: 01-1/02-2-504-3/24 of September 10, 2024. In this way, the minister abused his official position under Article 383 of the Criminal Code of the Federation of BiH.

Meanwhile, on October 4, 2024, a state of natural disaster, floods, and landslides occurred in the Federation of BiH, and the two agencies for the Sava River Basin and the Adriatic Sea Basin were precisely responsible for undertaking activities within their jurisdiction, but due to the minister's inaction, who refused to act according to the Law due to political bargaining and thus abused his position, enormous damage occurred, along with loss of life, in Konjic, Jablanica, as well as in Fojnica, Kreševo, and Kiseljak, the complaint states.

The minister, knowing that he had committed an illegality and trying to shift responsibility to a "collective body, because a collective body cannot be held responsible," proposed an Information to the Government on October 4, 2024, regarding the status of management bodies in these agencies.

The Government considered this information at an urgent session to try to cover up the responsibility of the minister who was obliged to comply with the decision of the Cantonal Court in Sarajevo (which he did not) thereby committing a criminal offense under Article 351 of the Criminal Code of the Federation of BiH and appointing a legal Management Board of the Sava River Basin Agency on September 30, 2024, and thereafter legally appointing the Agency's director, which he consciously failed to do.

Furthermore, the minister, by abusing his official position, failed, due to political bargaining, to give consent to the appointment of the director of the Adriatic Sea Basin Agency, even though the Agency's Management Board submitted its Decision for approval in September 2024. In this way, the minister committed a criminal offense under Article 383 of the Criminal Code of the Federation of BiH.

By abusing his official position, the minister decapitated two key agencies (the Sava River Basin Agency and the Adriatic Sea Basin Agency) at a time when there was a threat of floods, which as the responsible minister he could and should have known, as he is precisely the minister for water management, and both agencies had also published flood warnings on their websites.

At the agencies, at the time of the landslides and floods (October 4, 2024), due to the minister's conscious omission, there were no responsible persons, i.e., directors, and in the case of the Sava River Basin Agency, not even a legal Management Board, meaning there were no bodies to undertake activities prescribed by the Water Law, which resulted in material damage and, more importantly, loss of life.

All documentation regarding this exists, and the damage and loss of life could have been prevented if the work in the agencies had been within the legal framework, for which Minister Hrnjić is solely to blame, the complaint states.