City Administration's Reaction: April 6th as Sarajevo City Day Will Never Be Questioned

SARAJEVO, (Patria) - The Sarajevo City Administration issued a public statement calling on the Cantonal Board of the Social Democratic Party of BiH in Sarajevo to immediately withdraw its public statement and publicly apologize to the citizens of BiH for spreading false information about the abolition of April 6th as Sarajevo City Day!

"Sarajevo City Day remains April 6th, and that will never be called into question. The claim by the SDP Cantonal Board that there is any initiative to abolish it is false and inaccurate. We call on the SDP to familiarize themselves with the content of the documents adopted by the City Council of Sarajevo and not to mislead the public.

This administration of the City of Sarajevo has not, nor will it ever, relativize the significance of historical dates important to the city. On the contrary, the commemoration of April 6th has gained special intensity, emotion, and significance in recent years.

It was precisely on that day that the Mayor of Sarajevo, Abdulah Skaka, opened the new Trebević Cable Car, which is the pride of the City today!

For the sake of truth and the public, it is necessary to emphasize again that there is an initiative, the draft of which was adopted by the City Council of Sarajevo, based on an initiative from non-governmental organizations, to determine the Founding Day of the City of Sarajevo. This in no way changes the fact that April 6th is Sarajevo City Day, just as it does not change the already adopted decision that April 5th will be the Day of the Beginning of the Siege of Sarajevo.

There is a desire for Sarajevo, like many other cities in Europe and the world, to have a date that marks the beginning of the city's development in this area, for the purpose of preserving our heritage, memory, tradition, and identity.

This initiative has existed for several years. We approached it with maximum seriousness, involved all relevant factors, experts, institutions, organized round tables, prepared elaborations, and all this before it formally entered the procedure as an initiative. A few weeks ago, the City Council of Sarajevo accepted the initiative and sent it for public debate, and the final decision is now awaited.

Sarajevo has many important dates in its history, and an official founding date of the city would, in a way, recognize and also repay its debt to its founder Isa-beg Ishaković, who was marginalized, forgotten, and systematically denied for decades during a difficult time for the people and the city. As a nation, as a city, and as a state, we have a need to preserve institutional memory.

We have forgotten too much and too often, and now is the time to change that," the City of Sarajevo announced.