SARAJEVO, FEBRUARY 1 (ONASA) – In the first year of its mandate, the BiH Council of Ministers carried out activities to fulfill 104 promises out of a total of 254, as many as were given by the eight parties that formed the state level of executive power.
Of that number, four promises have been fulfilled, while work has begun to fulfill 100 promises. One promise was assessed as broken, while no activities were recorded to fulfill 149 promises.
The monitoring of the fulfillment of pre-election promises carried out by Istinomjer includes the promises of eight political parties (SNSD, HDZ BiH, SDP BiH, Naša stranka, NiP, DNS, BH Greens and United Srpska) that formed the Council of Ministers of BiH on January 25, 2023. Istinomjer collected the promises from the pre-election programs presented by political parties ahead of the 2022 General Elections, as well as from the official websites and social networks of political parties and from recordings of pre-election meetings of those parties that did not have a program.
SDP BiH made the most promises for this level of government (102), while DNS and United Srpska had only one promise each, and SNSD two.
Of these three parties from Republika Srpska that participate in the work of the Council of Ministers, only United Srpska had a pre-election program, which mostly related to the level of Republika Srpska.
NiP made 75 promises, Naša stranka 38, HDZ BiH 22 and BH Zeleni 13 promises.
The most promises were made in the field of economics (69); 58 promises were made in the area of the rule of law; 43 of them in the field of education, sports and culture; 39 promises were made in the field of foreign policy; 35 in the field of state organization and five promises each in the fields of health and social policy.
The only fulfilled promise in the field of economy related to the increase of the limit for entering the VAT system, which was given by NiP, and it was fulfilled after in November 2023 the Proposal of the Law on Amendments to the Law on Value Added Tax was adopted in the PSBiH the threshold for entering the VAT system was increased from 50,000 to 100,000 BAM.
On the other hand, this move violated the promise of Our Party that the threshold for entry into the VAT system would be reduced.
Work has begun in this area to fulfill 24 promises, and among them are some from the energy sector, such as developing the electricity market, increasing energy efficiency, increasing electricity production from renewable sources, improving the natural gas market, and others.
In addition, work was also done on the development of the port of Brčko, the creation of navigation conditions on the Sava River, but also on several promises related to the preservation of nature, such as the development of the green economy, decarbonization of the energy system, mitigation of climate change and support for the purchase of electric vehicles. drive.
In the area of the rule of law, two promises related to changes to the Law on the High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council, which were taken from the programs of the SDP BiH and Naša stranka, were fulfilled.
The Law on Amendments to the Law on the High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council of Bosnia and Herzegovina, proposed by the Council of Ministers of BiH, was adopted by the PSBiH in September 2023.
During the first year of the mandate of the BiH Council of Ministers, work began on the implementation of another 35 promises in the area of the rule of law. Some of them are an increase in the budget of the OS and GP BiH, the fight against radicalism, extremism and terrorism, judicial reform and the fight against corruption, and others.
The fourth fulfilled promise during the current mandate of the BiH Council of Ministers was recorded in the field of foreign policy, and related to the initiation of the law on foreign affairs of BiH.
This promise of NiP was adopted after the Council of Ministers, on the proposal of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, unanimously approved the Draft Law on Foreign Affairs of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Among the 19 promises that were evaluated as initiated in this area were those on improving cooperation with the NATO alliance, fulfilling 14 priorities from the Opinion of the European Commission and opening new DKPs.
Out of 43 promises in the field of education, culture and sports, work has started on fulfilling 12 of them.
During the first year of the mandate of the state government, activities were carried out to invest in the natural and humanities, so the budget of BiH institutions and international obligations of BiH for the year 2023 foresees 10,000 BAM for the item “Grants to non-profit organizations – Prize for Science” and a 100,000 BAM grant for implementation of bilateral cooperation projects in the field of science based on international agreements.
Activities were also carried out to implement promises related to innovation support, and the budget for 2023 provides 117,000 BAM to support technical culture and innovation.
Even after the budget planned 100,000 BAM grant funds for the awarding of monetary awards for deserving and top athletes of the international class and 10,000 BAM for the awarding of the state award for sports, the promise of scholarships and financial support for young and top athletes was rated as started.
In addition, certain activities were carried out in this area on the accreditation and supervision of higher education institutions and the promotion and protection of the cultural and historical heritage of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In the field of state regulation, activities were carried out on eight promises which, after one year of the mandate of the Council of Ministers, were assessed as started, while no activities were recorded on the fulfillment of 27 promises.
Although e-government still does not exist at the level of BiH, the promise of its establishment was considered to have begun after in January 2024 the director of the Indirect Taxation Administration of BiH, Zoran Tegeltija, presented the Minister of Communications and Transport of BiH, Edin Forto, with a digital qualified signature.
The electronic signature should enable the development of digital public administration services and facilitate communication with citizens.
The promise of the digital transformation of public administration was evaluated as a start.
Some of the promises on which certain activities were carried out are the establishment of a system of unified public procurement and the online availability of documents of public importance.
Out of a total of five promises made in the field of social policy, work has begun to fulfill four, which mainly related to returnees.
Thus, activities were carried out to close collective centers, create security and economic prerequisites for returnees, increase investment in returnee environments, and activities to finance the inclusion of the Roma community were also recorded.
No activities were recorded on the establishment of a single database on donations allocated for returnees.
In the field of health, no activities were recorded to fulfill the five promises made, two of which related to the legalization of cannabis and cannabinoid oils for medical purposes, two to the formation of new institutions and councils in the field of health, and one to the creation of a publicly available register of health workers in BiH.
If we look at the individual parties, NiP had the most promises on which activities were carried out in the first year of the mandate of the BiH Council of Ministers, three of whose promises were fulfilled and 39 were started. One SDP promise was fulfilled in the first year of the mandate, while another 25 promises from the party’s program were started.
Activities to fulfill another 15 promises of HDZ, 12 promises each of BH Greens and Our Party and one promise of DNS were recorded.
In relation to the monitoring of the progress of the fulfillment of pre-election promises at the level of the Council of Ministers of BiH in the first 100 days, six promises were transferred to lower levels of government after the received responses from the institutions because the entity authorities are responsible for their activities.
Percentage-wise, only slightly more than 40% of the promises were evaluated as fulfilled (1.6%) or started (39.6%), while work has not started on about 59% of the promises made. No promise after the first year received a grade in progress.
After the first year of the mandate of the Council of Ministers of BiH, it can be concluded that the activities were carried out on less than half of the promises made, and compared to the first 100 days, progress was made on slightly more than 30 promises.
The Council of Ministers of BiH focused its activities in the first year of its mandate on fulfilling 14 priorities from the Opinion of the European Commission from 2019, which are a condition for the start of negotiations for the accession of our country to the EU, and as stated in the last EC report from November 2023, until then only two were fulfilled, and several more were partially fulfilled.