FBiH Government Did Not Consider Appointment of 'Pensioner' Lukač as FUP Director

The Government of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina did not discuss today the proposal of the Independent Board of the FBiH Parliament regarding the appointment of Dragan Lukač as director of the Federal Police Administration (FUP), which was submitted last week by the FBiH Minister of Interior Predrag Kurteš, writes the Bosnian news agency Patria.

According to the legal procedure, if the proposal signed by Kurteš is not accepted by the Government, and the Board confirms its earlier decision, it is simultaneously interpreted as a decision on appointment. In this way, the parliamentary working body is placed above the executive authority, i.e., the FBiH Government, in the decision-making chain. 

As we learn from the FBiH Government, neither among the ministers from the SDA nor the SDP, who form the majority, is there any willingness to even consider the proposal submitted by Kurteš, because they believe that „Lukač should go into retirement.“

- As far as we know, he meets the conditions for retirement, and it indeed seems absurd for a pensioner to be the director of the FUP. Therefore, Minister Kurteš's proposal was not considered today, and I do not believe it will be on the agenda of any of the upcoming sessions of this Government term, our interlocutor states.

Although Patria sent an official request to the Federal MUP, asking whether Dragan Lukač meets the conditions for retirement, no response has been received even after 20 days of waiting.

The head of the administration sector in the Federal MUP, Josip Cvitanović, diligently performed his task regarding Lukač's request to provide a list of MUP employees who, as of December 31, 2014, meet the conditions for retirement, and on the list of four to five names, he also included Dragan Lukač.

In addition to the list, Cvitanović also provided the director with a notification that a procedure for termination of employment had been initiated for him and other employees who meet the conditions for retirement.

The current FUP director crossed out his name and removed the documentation, even though by the end of this year he will have completed 40 years and 7 months of service, and he duly applied for the Independent Board's competition for the appointment of the FUP director.

Four out of five present members of the Independent Board (two did not attend) voted for Lukač to be selected as the best candidate, although another candidate, Svevlad Hoffmann, raised numerous well-argued criticisms.

For the record, as Patria has already reported, pressure on the members of the Independent Board to select Lukač, despite other qualified candidates having applied, was exerted by Aljoša Čampara, the closest associate of Bakir Izetbegović, as he is attempting, in the personnel reshuffling of the new FBiH Government term, to secure the position of federal minister of interior for himself.