If Voters will in the future only vote for candidates of their own ethnicity and only Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats can run for president, who am I going to vote for, asked Roma activist Dervo Sejdic, commenting the ongoing negotiations on electoral reform.

He argued that Croat candidates should be elected only out of majority Croat cantons, thereby ensuring that only Croats can vote for Croat representatives. This would mean that every ethnic group in the country would only vote for candidates of its own group although the upper uouse and the presidency can only be filled with Bosniaks Croats and Serbs.  

This clashes directly with another court ruling from 2009. Dervo Sejdic and former Head of the Jewish Community, Jakob Finci, sued Bosnia for it’s discriminatory constitution barring them – as they are neither Bosniaks, Croats or Serbs – of running for president or upper house lawmaker. The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg ruled in favour of Sejdic and Finci, saying the state is discriminating against them as a Roma and a Jew.

One ruling was based on Bosnia’s constitution, the other one on the European Convention on Human Rights.

If the Croat-initiated ruling would be implemented the way the Bosnian Croats want it to be, this would further discriminate minorities and leave Sejdic with nobody to vote for, let alone to run for lawmaker or president.  

“I don’t want to be rude, but I do not know of any other country in Europe with such a constitution,” Sejdic said.  

“Only a Bosniak, a Croat and a Serb can run for president, which is nonsense. Rascism and fascism start with discrimination and discrimination starts with unequal rights,” he said.