The Path of Ivan Rogić: Deputy Director of the PIO/MIO Fund Appointed Despite Hague Papers on Investigations

The Government of the Federation of BiH recently appointed Kenan Spahić, the previous acting director, as the President of the Board of Directors of the Institute for Medical Expertise.

Spahić himself, while serving as acting president of the Board of Directors, altered the competition requirements by removing the main condition – experience in medical expertise in the field of pension and disability insurance and social protection, Patria reports.

With the approval of the Minister of Labor and Social Policy, Vesko Drljača (SBB), he adjusted the competition conditions to suit himself, and afterwards, as the "best" among the candidates, he was appointed to this position.

Furthermore, last summer, again with the consent of Minister Drljača, Spahić removed from the competition for the appointment of the Deputy Director of the PIO/MIO Fund the mandatory document in all procedures – the Certificate that no criminal proceedings are being conducted against the candidate.

In this way, he paved the way for Ivan Rogić, one of the key associates of HDZ BiH leader Dragan Čović, who has a compromising war past. Therefore, in the political calculations after he completed the task, it was expected that Spahić would also be appointed as the President of the Board of Directors of the Institute for Medical Expertise.

An investigation was conducted against Rogić in The Hague on suspicion of committing war crimes, after which the Hague Tribunal forwarded this case to the Prosecutor's Office of BiH for further action. When asked whether proceedings are being conducted against Rogić, the Prosecutor's Office of BiH only briefly stated that they have "no comment."

The Federal Government appointed Rogić as Deputy Director of the PIO/MIO Fund in mid-July, a position he held until 2011 as a cadre of HDZ BiH.

Under Drljača's watchful eye, Spahić thus enabled Rogić not to submit the certificate that everyone else must provide, and he smoothly passed into this important position.

Rogić was the wartime president of HDZ BiH in Jablanica. As one of the HVO commanders, he is suspected of having committed the criminal offense of war crimes against Bosniaks in the surrounding villages in the spring of 1993.

He continued his active engagement in HDZ BiH over the past two decades. He was the organizer of one of the final rallies in Jablanica during the election campaign of party leader Dragan Čović for the member of the Presidency of BiH from the Croatian people.

Documentation from The Hague