Sead Hadzovic examines in the September 1-15, issue of the Belgrade by weekly "Republika" the situation within the political parties ahead of the elections and whether the political mood will shift towards democratically oriented parties.

The democratic public in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the international community see the general elections, in which 83 political parties, coalitions and alliances will participate and held on September 12 and 13, as the decisive ones for a radical change of current power of the leading national parties.

Since the SDS lost in Republika Srpska during the last year’s parliamentary elections, and the Pale regime has been replaced, the new regime has to strengthen this advantage with these elections. As far as the replacement of leading parties in the Federation, SDA and HDZ, is concerned, the international community has oriented itself on pro-Bosnian, democratic opposition parties, estimating that, if united, they could radically endanger the position of the national parties. That is why it is giving the opposition open support. But, the only coalition that has been formed is the Center coalition, with four opposition, nationally unburdened parties of mainly liberal orientation, while the parties left of center; mainly social democratic parties did not unite. The last attempt of the international community during the Brussels meeting of eight opposition pro-Bosnian parties to unite has been successful as much as they agreed to coordinate pre-electoral activities, but there was no more binding coalition.

Instead of this, on the Croatian side, the current political rule of the HDZ has been seriously threatened by the internal division within the party (similar to previous division within the SDS in RS). This was prompted by the separation of Kresimir Zubak and his supporters from the hard core Herzegovina faction which thoroughly implement policies set up in Zagreb, and the formation of a new part, the New Croatian initiative, but which also has national trademarks. In difference to the HDZ, it accepts Bosnia and Herzegovina as its homeland, the return of refugees and exiled persons to their homes, particularly of Croats to Central Bosnia and Posavina and a renewal of joint life on the whole territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

It was only within the ruling SDA party that there was no division, even though it is being shaken by internal strife, caused first of all by the renewed candidacy of Alija Izetbegovic for the post of a member of the Presidency. He has become a charismatic personality Mon the Bosnia population and is keeping the SDA together through his authority.

As far as the electoral system is concerned, and which is based on the national-entity principle supplied by the Dayton agreement. This enables the candidates to win only through votes of an ethnic community to which they belong. So, the international community factors (OESCE) have attempted to find adequate solutions that will lower these advantages. So, among other things, to register a party, coalition or an independent candidate it is prerequisite to supply a political platform (positions concerning the return of refugees and exiled persons, minority rights, etc.) and signing of a statement concerning the acceptance of the Dayton agreement, electoral codex and behavior and complete implementation of electoral results. The temporary electoral commission has removed a few hundred candidates due to the breach of these conditions by certain parties or candidates, most of which were of nationalistic character.

Besides the coalitions, a chance has been given at forming alliances (unions) of parties with same or similar political goals, so that with joint addition of votes, a number of mandates is determined for such an alliance, which is particularly suited to unions of relatively smaller opposition parties. It is envisaged that 30% of candidacies go to women.

Viewed from the detailed political - regulative position, the pre - electoral campaign has shown the following:

In the inter-national political competition, all means have been used to stimulate inter-national tension and fear due to supposed danger from the "animosity feelings" of another nation, where controlled terrorism is used since the beginning of the electoral campaign. The goal is national homogenization and winning the voters for the instigating party as the "protector of national interests."

Within the nation itself of this party, and particularly by those of nationalistic character, national arguments are exclusively used in competition, where the competing parties are not branded as the enemy, but as traitors, collaborators, or at least weak Serbs, Croats, Bosniaks.

The ruling national parties are misusing the power to burden the position opposition parties and their candidates, on whom different types of pressure is applied (firing from work, blackmail, instigation of fear, etc.). The fact is that this is also shown by the new RS government with its decision to replace the directors and editors in chief of 16 local radio and TV stations, since the SDS and the Radicals are using to the maximum these stations in the pre - electoral campaign.

The ruling elite’s do not want to see the refugees and exiled persons come back now, since they do hot want to move away from their houses and apartments the warriors and "deserved" party workers, because it is exactly this category of voters that represents the secure electoral base. But, it could be expected that this time, the voters from the ranks of exiles and exiled persons will not easily be misled by verbal and unfounded promises of the ruling national structures, but will elect those that will engage timelessness in resolving their current status, first of all, enabling them to return home as soon as possible.

The opposition parties re concentrating, first of all, on economic - social arguments and other similar values, orienting themselves towards the future, at the same time pointing the deadliness of the nationalistic policies of the ruling parties. Their biggest problem is the fact that they did not unite into a unified opposition block, which will have a negative impact on the election results.

According to the public researches so far, somewhat a smaller number of voters will come to the polls that last year, which is a consequence of apathy taking over the majority of the population due to uncertainty of poor life, and the fact that the refugees and exiled persons represent almost half of the voting population.

Even though the national criteria, due, first of all, to hard living conditions, is slowly on the vane it is still dominant in the decision making process of the voters, which is a reason why spectacular results should not be expected. in the sense of removal of the national parties from power.

Among the Bosniaks, the Coalition for the Unified and Democratic BiH (CDBiH), headed by SDA, is a clear favorite. Izetbegovic does not have a serious counter candidate for the seat on the BiH Presidency, remain it is to be expected that.

The key functions reserved for the Bosniaks in central and Federation institutions will go to the members of this coalition. The democratic opposition parties count upon a larger number of representatives in the parliament on all levels, but it is not expected that they could win a majority, except in certain cantons (Tuzla-Podrinje and Una-Sana).

Among the Croats, almost equal chances to win power is given to the HDZ and the newly formed New Croatian Initiative Party, which also goes for their heads - Ante Jelavic of HDZ and Kresimir Zubak of the NHI for the member of the Presidency and others from the ranks of these two parties for the key positions in the central and Federal institutions, which belong to the Croats . In Herzegovina, the advantage is in the favor of the HDZ, while in Sarajevo, Central Bosnia and Posavina cantons the chances re more on the side of the NHI, which is also supported by some smaller Croatian parties. Since Izetbegovic has no serious competitor , it is possible that though electoral engineering, a certain number of Bosniak voters votes for Zubak.

In RS the main competitors at winning power are: the Sloga coalition, composed of the Serb National Union (Biljana Plavsic), Socialist party of the RS (Zivko Radisic) and the Party of Independent Social Democrats (Milorad Dodik), and on the other side the SDS-Radical coalition (Momcilo Krajisnik of the SDS as the candidate for the BiH Presidency seat and Nikola Poplasen of the SRS as the candidate for the RS president). It is expected that the Sloga coalition will strengthen its position in power and that it will win key leadership[p positions (Zivko Radisic for the member of the BiH Presidency, Biljana Plavsic as the RS president, and Milorad Dodik as the president of the RS government), and that the majority of posts in the central institutions will now go to the Coalition and not the ranks of the Pale regime. These parties are entering the RS parliamentary elections alone it is expected that the absolute , or at least relative majority of the mandates will be won by the parties from the Sloga coalition, and that the SDS and SRS will not win more than 20-30% of the mandates. The CDBiH coalition headed by the SDA and other opposition parties from the FBiH will win almost the same number of mandates in the RS parliament as in previous elections, as it should also be taken into account that a number of mandates will be won by NHI which will participate in the RS elections, contrary to HDZ, which always boycotted these elections.


Source: Belgrade by weekly "Republika," September 1-15, 1998