Strategy confirmed authorities misled citizens that we would get EU candidate status by 2018.

SARAJEVO, (Patria) - The Social Democratic Party of Bosnia and Herzegovina welcomes the content of the new European Commission Strategy for the Western Balkans, which, unlike many previous similar documents and statements by EU officials that we were forced to listen to since October 2014, identifies problems, their depth and causes much more clearly.

SDP BiH calls on authorities at all levels to take the messages and warnings from this document very seriously, and to finally start listening to all those who believe that our country belongs in the European family and who are willing to contribute and be included in EU processes.

- BiH's most important task is to stop further isolation, decline, and emigration from BiH, which threatens it if it does not catch up with its neighbors by 2025. We assess the fact that, after the Thessaloniki Summit, the European perspective of our region is emphasized for the first time in a precise and unambiguous manner as positive.

On the other hand, we welcome the fact that the EU recognizes in this document the huge and negative impact of politics on judicial institutions, media, public companies and the economy, as well as huge corruption in public procurement, but also the connection between politics and organized crime.

Yesterday, the EU openly admitted what we in SDP BiH have been warning about for a long time, and that is that BiH authorities have been misleading the public and voters that our country would get EU candidate status by the 2018 elections and that everything was in the best order. The leaders of that deception competition - Čović and Zvizdić, together with their parties and coalition partners, will have to answer to the voters in eight months.

According to yesterday's reactions from the authorities in BiH, it is clear that in eight months they will offer the citizens of BiH a new dose of old and repackaged deceptions, promises that they will be better in the next term if they are just given another chance, all because of their vital party interest in continuing the functioning of the state, economy, media, judiciary, and administration, which are captured as clearly described in the EU Strategy.

SDP BiH will offer citizens of BiH, throughout its territory, a clear and detailed program, as well as clear policies that will constitute pro-European government programs that will free the country and citizens of BiH from the shackles of a captured state - states SDP.