The leaders of the ruling Bosnian Serb and Bosnian Croat parties said they agreed to form a coalition after the upcoming election which they expect to win.

Milorad Dodik heads the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats (SNSD) and is the President of the Bosnian Serb semi-autonomous entity, Republika Srpska.

He and Dragan Covic, the leader of the Croat Democratic Union (HDZ) and Croat member of the state Presidency, met in Mostar on Monday.

Both will be running for the three-member Presidency in the October election.

Covic said that, would the necessary changes to Bosnia’s Election Law have been passed and would they had ensured that one nation can not elect the representatives of another, the coalitions would have looked differently and the pre-election campaign would have been much more relaxed.

“Since that has not happened, our plan B has to provide a different view on coalitions so we can win overwhelmingly,” Covic said, adding that the two spoke of forming Bosnia’s state-level government so that “after the election there wouldn’t be any hold-up and so the government is formed as soon as possible”.

The two agreed that the months ahead of the October election should be “used efficiently” and discussed the upcoming May 20 visit of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to Sarajevo.

“Erdogan is a strong statesman, but he is getting too involved in internal issues in Bosnia,” Dodik said.

Covic would not comment on the Erdogan visit for the media.