Bosnia's Federation Moves to Form Government

In a controversial move, the constituent session of the House of Peoples in Bosnia's Federation was held today despite the fact that the Social Democrats and their partners have not reached agreement on forming a government with the main Croat parties.

At the session, 33 members of the House of Peoples of Bosnia's mainly Bosniak-Croat entity took the oath of office, in what is seen as the first step towards establishing a government in the entity. The House has 58 seats, but delegates from some majority Croat cantons have not been designated.

The Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, and the HDZ 1990, the two main Croat parties, did not attend the session on Thursday.

The parties held the session in defiance of a decision by the country’s Central Election Commission, which said that the constituent session cannot be held until all the cantons elect their representatives.

Commission spokeswoman Maksida Piric-Bajramovic told Balkan Insight that it is not up to the Central Election Commission to evaluate the legality of the session, but only to note that the conditions for awarding the delegates' mandate have not been met.

Meanwhile, the incumbent president of the Federation, Borjana Kristo from the HDZ, plans to file criminal charges against the chairman of the House of Peoples for "illegally" convening today's session.

Today's decision to hold the constituent session comes after months of political wrangling between the mainly Bosniak Social Democrats and their coalition partners, and the main Croat parties, over the composition of a new government.

On Wednesday night, negotiations to form a government failed after weeks of discussions.

The representatives of two main Croat parties were dissatisfied with the distribution of government positions designated for Croats by the Constitution.

“If we can't get five of the 17 seats in the federation's government and three seats in the state's Council of Ministers, it is our view that the HDZ BiH and HDZ 1990 does not want to participate in such government,” the leader of the HDZ, Dragan Covic, said last night.

Bozo Ljubic, head of HDZ 1990, warned that leaving Croat parties out of the Federation's government would have serious consequences, including early elections.

The HDZ parties have not delegated representatives from the cantons with Croat majorities, which threatened to block the constituent session today.

Meanwhile, some 3,000 students, war veterans and citizens protested today in Mostar.

The protests, organised by the University of Mostar's Student Union and the Croatian political science students forum, were also held in Siroki Brijeg, Vitez, Orasje, Zepce and Livno.

The demonstrators carried banners reading: "It is over now!", "Bosnia is our homeland", "Committed to equality".