The international community offered a solution that all political parties except the Croat Democratic Union (HDZ) found acceptable, said Secretary General of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) Irfan Cengic, commenting the ongoing talks on electoral reform in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Speaking for N1, Cengic said that solution to the issue of election of delegates in the House of Peoples should be sought for exactly in the Parliament of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH), Bosnia’s entity shared by Bosniaks and Croats.

“The Venice Commission clearly said that the Election Law is nothing but the operationalising of the FBiH Constitution,” added Cengic.

The Venice Commission experts have arrived in Bosnia again this month to help Bosnian authorities and political leaders to find a solution to disputable law provisions and the way in which the Constitutional Court’s decision treating this matter would be implemented. After the May talks yielded no specific results, the talks have resumed this week again.

The Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina ruled two years ago that the provisions of the Election Law treating the election of the Federation's House of Peoples members were inconsistent with the state Constitution, setting the timeframe for the competent institutions to act and apply the necessary changes. Until today, political leaders have not reached an agreement on how would the court’s decision be implemented and the Election Law amended.

Cengic, whose SDP is taking part in the talks on the Election Law changes, said the international community did not exert pressure on the parties but was helping them find a solution.

Following this week’s talks, some of the participants unveiled in media that a “temporary solution” was on the table but they provided no details of what would that solution entail.

According to Cengic, the proposal stipulates that the delegates in the House of Peoples are elected in accordance with the 1991 population census, instead of the one from 2013, which HDZ BiH objects. In his opinion, their concern that this temporary solution would become permanent is “fake” and, he added, the problem lies in HDZ BiH’s lack of respect for the FBiH Constitution.