Bosnia and Herzegovina: Nationalists set the tone

Today’s elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina are considered the most complicated in the world. The country is divided into three parts, nationalism and corruption from all sides are paralyzing it on its way to the EU.

The election campaign event of the Serbian nationalists resembles a folk festival. Around 1,000 people are sitting under tarpaulins on beer benches in the village of Nova Topola near Banja Luka, in the very north of the Serbian region of Republika Srpska. There is suckling pig, grilled sausages and schnapps for everyone, donated by the governing party SNDS. A live band plays Balkan folk, in front of the stage people dance in circles – Kolo.

Enter Milorad Dodik, the Serbian representative in the three-man state presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Now he is running for president of the Republic of Srpska. He is a nationalist and separatist and propagates secession from Bosnia.

Appeal for cohesion – to your own people

Tonight, however, he’s holding back. “Many of the side try to drag the politics of a completely normal people into the mud. We have to stick together as a people,” Dodik calls out to the cheering crowd.

He says that Republika Srpska has powerful friends: Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić, Hungarian President Viktor Orbán and Russian President Vladimir Putin. “I can call and say that I’m missing something today, and then I’ll get it,” says Dodik, scoffing that, unlike the EU, the Republic of Srpska doesn’t have to freeze because it gets gas from Russia.

Image of the tormented people

Dodik further heats up the atmosphere by depicting the Serbs as a people tormented: by the Ottomans, by Austria-Hungary and by the Nazis in World War II. And the Serbs also suffered in the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s, according to Dodik.

What is not mentioned is that, according to the UN, Bosnian Serb troops committed around 80 percent of the war crimes in the Bosnian war. In the past, Dodik has repeatedly denied the genocide of the Bosniaks in Srebrenica, which killed more than 8,000 people. This is punishable in Bosnia.

“Formation of national-ethnic muscles”

“Dodik delivers election campaign folklore that’s all about building national-ethnic muscles,” says Tanja Topić from the Friedrich Ebert Foundation in Banja Luka, which is close to the SPD. She sees Dodik primarily as a nationalist rhetoric. “Since 2010 we have had several resolutions for a secession in the parliament of the Republic of Srpska, but nothing ever happened,” says Topić.

After all, Dodik is the most popular politician in the region and the favorite in Sunday’s elections. The firing continues.

Heated mood also in Herzegovina

The mood among many Bosnian Croats is similarly heated. They live mainly in the southwest of the country of the Bosnian-Croatian Federation, in Herzegovina. Since the last elections in 2018, they have felt betrayed. At that time, HDZ Bosnia boss Dragan Čović deselected as Croatian representative in the all-Bosnian state presidency. He lost to Željko Komšić, whom many Croatians don’t consider a real Croatian.

“The majority of the communities in which the Croats live have declared the gentleman posing as a Croatian representative persona non grata,” says Mate Lončar, the leader of the Bosnian HDZ youth.

“Those who live here simply vote”

Komšić is significantly further to the left than the HDZ, which is considered Christian-conservative to nationalist. He states that he wants to overcome ethno-nationalism and is getting the approval of the Bosniaks in particular. He also has his voters mainly in the cantons of the Bosnian-Croatian Federation, in which the majority of Bosniaks live. In the federation everyone can vote for everyone else, the Bosniaks the Croatian representative and vice versa.

The left-wing Bosnian-Croatian journalist Stefica Galić from Mostar thinks that’s right. “There is no ethnically segregated vote, but those who live here simply vote. The alleged oppression of Croats is nothing more than an HDZ mantra. Their leader Čović has amassed incredible wealth and has had court cases on his neck, while more and more Croats from Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Croats should question that,” says Galić.

What does the ruling party want?

Patriotism and nationalism are also pronounced in Herzegovina in the strongest party in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the SDA. It represents the Bosniak majority population. The philosopher and political scientist from the University of Sarajevo Asim Mujkić sees a difference here, however.

“Dodik would like the Republika Srpska to unite with Serbia at some point. The HDZ dreams of its own Croatian part of the country. The SDA, on the other hand, wants the unity of Bosnia and Herzegovina, but under their dominance. Because more than 50 percent of the population are Bosniaks,” says Mujkic.

The weakness of bourgeois parties

The nationalists set the tone in government and in parliaments. Bourgeois parties are only given opportunities at the local level, especially in the big city of Sarajevo.

Mujkić demands that the EU strengthen bourgeois forces. “German foreign policy under Angela Merkel made a mistake. It relied on the strongest political forces in the region. That’s how the Serbian president should be Vučić provide stability, which failed. The EU should rather stand up for values ​​like freedom, human rights and social rights,” says Mujkic.

But as long as politics in Bosnia and Herzegovina is so divided and corrupt, EU accession will remain a long way off, and one of the biggest problems will not be solved either: the emigration of young, well-educated people. About 170,000 people left the country last year. With a population of 3.3 million, that’s a lot.