SDA and HDZ rejected stopping the predatory privatization

The ruling SDA-HDZ coalition rejected the proposed conclusions of the delegate of the Social Democratic Party of BiH, Slaviša Šućur, at the session of the House of Peoples of the Parliament of FBiH, which called for the suspension of all privatization processes in FBiH and the adoption of a new Law on Privatization and a Law on Public Goods within 60 days, the SDP announced.

- By rejecting these conclusions, SDA and HDZ clearly supported the continuation of predatory privatization, enabled by the current Law. Instead of an honest and transparent privatization process, SDA and HDZ chose to support a privatization model that left hundreds of thousands of people jobless.

The proposed conclusions by delegate Šućur called on the Government of FBiH to suspend all state capital privatization processes in FBiH until the new Law on Privatization and the Law on Public Goods of FBiH come into force. Furthermore, within 60 days, the Government was supposed to draft and submit to the Parliament of FBiH for regular procedure the draft of the new Law on Privatization and the draft Law on Public Goods of FBiH.

The explanations for these conclusions state that the new Law on Privatization of FBiH must be based on the principles of transparency, efficiency, maximization of value achieved through state capital privatization, exclusivity of job retention, and special valuation of new job creation in the privatization process, as well as special valuation of ensuring new technologies and markets in the privatization process.

Additionally, all state capital privatization processes and methods must be clearly and precisely regulated by law to prevent the current practice where the rules of the Privatization Agency stipulate provisions that constitute legal matters. Beyond this, it is necessary to clearly establish a system for making decisions on state capital privatization between the legislative and executive authorities, which includes effective parliamentary oversight by the Parliament of FBiH over privatization processes.

The new Law on Public Goods of FBiH should be based on the principles of protection, preservation, and improvement of the value of key resources of FBiH and their definition as property that cannot be transferred as ownership to any legal or natural person under any legal basis, including in the privatization process. This particularly applies to forests, land, water, and infrastructure used in the energy, infrastructure, oil, and communication sectors - according to the SDP.