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Bosnia goes to the polls as ethnic divisions grow
Amid secession threats and fears of fresh political turmoil
30 September, 09:05
(ANSA-AFP) - SARAJEVO, SEP 30 - With ethnic divisions growing
deeper, Bosnia will hold general elections on Sunday amid
secession threats and fears of fresh political turmoil nearly
three decades after war ravaged the Balkan nation. The country
is torn between secessionist Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croats
demanding greater autonomy, while Muslim Bosniaks calling for a
more egalitarian state appear to be chasing little more than a
pipedream. For more than two decades, the impoverished Balkan
state has been governed by a dysfunctional administrative system
born out of the 1995 Dayton Agreement. And while the accords may
have succeeded in ending the war in the 1990s, the country has
withered amid political paralysis ever since. Analysts have
warned that Bosnia is sinking ever deeper into troubled waters
with divisions along ethnic lines appearing to grow even further
on the eve of elections.
Bosnia is divided between a Serb entity -- the Republika Srpska (RS) -- and a Muslim-Croat federation linked by a weak central government. With Bosnia's three main groups rarely mixing in the wake of the war, ethnic political parties have long exploited the country's fault lines in a bid to maintain power, driving hundreds of thousands abroad in search of better opportunities.
With little to no polling data to rely on, analysts say incumbents and nationalist parties are likely to dominate many of the contests, including long-time Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik, who is running for the presidency of the RS. For months, Dodik has been stoking tensions amid frequent calls for Bosnia's Serbs to separate even further from the country's central institutions. Bakir Izetbegovic, the son of the first president of independent Bosnia -- is running for a third term as the country's Bosniak Muslim president but is facing stiff competition from 46-year-old history professor Denis Becirovic.
Backed by 11 opposition parties, Becirovic is vowing to fight for a "pro-European and united" Bosnia. To add to the growing divide, many of the country's Catholic Croats have been pleading for greater autonomy or electoral reforms during the run-up to the polls, with the leading nationalist party HDZ threatening to boycott the contest for months. (ANSA-AFP).
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Bosnia is divided between a Serb entity -- the Republika Srpska (RS) -- and a Muslim-Croat federation linked by a weak central government. With Bosnia's three main groups rarely mixing in the wake of the war, ethnic political parties have long exploited the country's fault lines in a bid to maintain power, driving hundreds of thousands abroad in search of better opportunities.
With little to no polling data to rely on, analysts say incumbents and nationalist parties are likely to dominate many of the contests, including long-time Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik, who is running for the presidency of the RS. For months, Dodik has been stoking tensions amid frequent calls for Bosnia's Serbs to separate even further from the country's central institutions. Bakir Izetbegovic, the son of the first president of independent Bosnia -- is running for a third term as the country's Bosniak Muslim president but is facing stiff competition from 46-year-old history professor Denis Becirovic.
Backed by 11 opposition parties, Becirovic is vowing to fight for a "pro-European and united" Bosnia. To add to the growing divide, many of the country's Catholic Croats have been pleading for greater autonomy or electoral reforms during the run-up to the polls, with the leading nationalist party HDZ threatening to boycott the contest for months. (ANSA-AFP).
