Minister Katica, take responsibility: We do not blame the police - we blame you and the commissioner personally

(Patria) - Minister of Interior of Sarajevo Canton Admir Katica tried to shift his own responsibility, and even greater responsibility of the police commissioner of the MUP KS Fatmir Hajdarević for the compromised security situation in Sarajevo onto police officers.

In his address to the public, which followed justified criticism from the opposition, the media, and even representatives of the ruling parties in Sarajevo Canton, Minister Katica stated that he "does not allow exclusive responsibility to be attributed to the MUP of Sarajevo Canton - Police Administration" and that he does not understand "why such pressure is being exerted on the police and the MUP of Sarajevo Canton."

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Katica: Why is such pressure being exerted on the police and MUP KS, and not on other factors in society?

(Patria) - Minister of Interior of KS Admir Katica announced today that events occurred over the previous weekend that contributed to undermining citizens' sense of security, adding that members of the Police Administration of MUP KS worked intensively

Instead of accepting responsibility together with Commissioner Hajdarević for the state of (in)security in Sarajevo, Minister Katica decided to hide behind the police officers of MUP KS together with Hajdarević, trying to present justified criticism as an attack on honorable police officers.

Therefore, it is important to emphasize that no one blames police officers for the compromised security situation in Sarajevo Canton. The culprits are directly Admir Katica and Fatmir Hajdarević, as well as the entire ruling clique of the Troika, which not only entrusted the security system to ignoramuses and incompetent personnel, but also remains silent and buries its head in the sand, pretending not to hear the increasingly frequent gunshots echoing through the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Minister Katica completely reversed the arguments and tried to politicize justified criticism that should serve him as guidelines for improving the situation in the area of security. Everyone in Sarajevo is clear that the police are diligently doing their job, but it is equally clear that they are doing what they are told and ordered. And they are ordered by the commissioner. If the quality of police work is measured by the number of issued misdemeanor tickets for illegal parking, while fan hooligans rampage through the city, while minors are shot at, while teenagers die, while there is no part of the city where fights do not break out, then we are in serious trouble.

One of the few who managed to overshadow Katica in his senseless attempt to justify the poor leadership and incompetence of Katica and Hajdarević is the Chairman of the Assembly of Sarajevo Canton, Elvedin Okerić. He stated that "the Collegium of the Assembly of KS requested information from the institutions responsible for implementing the conclusions from the last thematic session on traffic safety," as if shootings, constant physical confrontations between fans, beatings, and murder by firearms have anything to do with "traffic safety." The traffic situation is catastrophic, but that is just one segment in which those responsible in MUP KS have failed.

The fact that the security situation is completely politicized is also evidenced by the silence of the Independent Board of the Assembly of KS, which monitors the work of the police commissioner, supervises the application of the police commissioner's authority in management, and so on. Perhaps the silence is even good because, following the example of authoritarian regimes, the Troika government in Sarajevo Canton appointed a suitable Independent Board that is not so independent of NiP and cannot provide a truly independent and objective assessment of the police commissioner's work.

The Troika government also managed to hide from the public that a serious 35-page complaint was recently submitted to the Independent Board, the Security Commission of the Assembly of KS, and Minister Katica, signed by one of the chief inspectors of MUP KS, containing the most serious allegations against the work of the police commissioner. Did Okerić and Katica act in accordance with the law and forward the complaint to the competent prosecutor's office, which was their obligation, will the Independent Board initiate disciplinary proceedings against the commissioner, are they afraid of their own responsibility - these are questions that primarily Okerić and Katica need to answer.

The leadership of MUP KS, instead of focusing on prevention, police training, stimulating inspectors, and so on, has spent the past year mainly on internal transfers of police officers. These transfers are questionable from the aspect of legality and will certainly be the subject of investigations one day, and they have also been problematized in the complaint filed against the police commissioner. The obligation of the Government and the Assembly of KS is to create an environment in which police officers will not fear being transferred from one municipality on the principle - "I am transferring you because I can."

The silence of representatives and ministers from the ranks of SDP and Our Party on the security situation in Sarajevo Canton is particularly devastating. It only proves that for the authorities in Sarajevo Canton, harmonious coalition relations are much more important than the security and even the lives of the citizens of Sarajevo Canton.