The worst curse in Sarajevo is "May the Three solve your problems" - NUBBiH is an example

By: Muamer Bandić, member of the Presidency of the Party for BiH and representative in the KS Assembly

When the Three start publicly boasting that they have solved or will solve a problem, only then should you truly be concerned because rest assured it will not be as announced in the media. Every "solution" by the Three so far has looked like a TV commercial for a McDonald's hamburger, which looks nice and big on small screens, creating an expectation in the viewer that they will eat well, but when you actually order a "Big Mac," you quickly realize it's not what you expected.

This time, unfortunately, the employees of the National and University Library of Bosnia and Herzegovina (NUBBiH) have experienced this fabricated reality, who at yesterday's press conference sent out a plea to the BiH public for the salvation of this valuable institution.

It has only been a month since the news that the KS Government adopted the Bill on Temporary Assumption of Co-financing of Cultural and Educational Institutions, whose founder is Bosnia and Herzegovina. This cantonal law defines the temporary assumption of co-financing of institutions from the Budget of Sarajevo Canton until a final solution is adopted, and defines the status and method of financing and operation in order to ensure the survival, functioning, and daily work of these institutions, preventing their endangerment, and it applies to seven institutions: the National and University Library of BiH, the Historical Museum of BiH, the Museum of Literature and Theater Arts of BiH, the BiH Cinematheque, the Art Gallery of BiH, the National Museum of BiH, the Library for the Blind and Visually Impaired in BiH.
The Government proposed the adoption of the Law under an urgent procedure, i.e., without adequate public debate.

I voted against the urgent procedure and very energetically opposed the adoption of the law through this non-standard procedure because laws are generally not adopted under an urgent procedure.

I believed that without adequate public debate, without a serious analysis of how the norms defined by the law will be applied in practice, we could make omissions that would affect the quality of the law.

Ultimately, the KS Assembly supported this Law, giving the KS Government a free hand to solve the long-standing problems of these essential cultural and historical institutions for our people and state. But, as I pointed out at the session itself regarding possible omissions during the adoption of the law under an urgent procedure, as well as with the advertisement mentioned at the beginning of the text, the final product of the cantonal law is diametrically different from what the KS Government pompously announced. The employees of NUBBiH were met with a cold shower by the information from Minister Mesić that only 220,000 KM was allocated for their institution this year, an amount sufficient only to cover two months of employee salaries.

It must be emphasized that these institutions have been neglected for decades by their founder, the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and survive through superhuman efforts and selfless engagement of employees. They are financed and survive thanks to projects, competitions, and grants, and they preserve the historical memory and cultural heritage of all peoples and the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

It should also be noted that in 2012, three cultural institutions were temporarily closed, thanks to the "expert" engagement of the then SDP Deputy Minister of Civil Affairs of BiH, Denise Sarajlić-Maglić, to whom the then Minister Sredoje Nović left the discretion to determine the amounts for financing these institutions. SDP expert Sarajlić-Maglić then determined the minimal and insufficient amount, which Minister Nović happily signed, ultimately leading to the two-year closure of the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina as well.

Today, these institutions, of exceptional social and state importance, are again on the verge of closure thanks to the Three's smartest and bravest "experts" on everything, who will talk to you at length and sweetly about how they have a solution for all our problems. In doing so, intoxicated by their own lies, they will completely ignore that there is a constitutional-legal order, fiscal reality, and our brutal political everyday life and its even worse actors, which are variables that often make these "solutions" unfeasible in practice.

In this way, largely due to the unseriousness and ignorance of the Prime Minister and ministers in the current KS Government, cultural institutions and their employees have once again been pushed into agony, even worse than the one they were in before the cantonal Law was adopted. The Three's Government will succeed in 2024 with a pen in what Karadžić's phalanxes failed with cannons in 1992, to complete the culturocide of the cultural and historical heritage of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Therefore, I call on the Prime Minister and ministers in the KS Government to get serious and stand behind their words in practice, and finally, to stand behind the implementation of the Law they proposed themselves and for which they received unanimous support from us representatives in the KS Assembly, and to provide the National and University Library of Bosnia and Herzegovina with the necessary funds for its unhindered work, instead of acting smart and allocating funds along crony, party, or family lines, as they have done so far.

Gentlemen, respect the law you wrote yourselves, because I am starting to suspect that if NUBBiH happened to be located in Grude or Široki Brijeg, and not in Sarajevo, its financing would not be a problem. As you are starting to implement your "salvation solutions," soon the worst curse in Sarajevo will be: "May the Three solve your problems!"