Social Democratic Party’s (SDP) Secretary general Irfan Cengic, told N1 that the SDP’s General Board had already passed this party’s election lists for the upcoming October general election. He said the SDP’s candidate for Bosnia’s tripartite Presidency has the support of numerous parties and he will represent all Bosnian citizens if elected.

We are the first party to have completed and adopted our election candidate lists and they will be submitted to the Central Election Commission (CEC BH) by Monday,” Cengic told N1.

When asked which parties will the SDP not enter a coalition with, he said: “We oppose the nationalist parties which are currently in power. Our goal is to remove the Democratic Action Party (SDA) and the Croat Democratic Union (HDZ BiH) from power in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH) entity, and the Alliance of Independent Social Democrats from the Republika Srpska (RS) entity.”

Bosnia and Herzegovina consists of two semi-autonomous entities, the Bosniak-Croat dominated FBiH and the Serb dominated RS.

When it comes to the RS, the SDP had announced and presented a ‘Pro-European bloc’ earlier.

“We’ll have a number of parties from our Pro-European bloc competing to enter the RS Parliament. When it comes to the State Parliament the parties will support the SDP’s candidates and we have will three candidates from the bloc for the RS Vice President,” he said. “We expect to be a parliamentary party in the RS and for that entity to move forward on its European path.”

Speaking about SDP’s candidate for Bosnia’s tripartite Presidency Denis Becirovic, Cengic claims he has everything necessary for this position.

“He will bring a new energy into the Presidency; Bosnia’s interests will be placed first. He was supported by multiple parties, even some centre-right parties. Not all presidency members presented all Bosnian citizens during their time in office, but Becirovic will,” he stressed.

In the end, Cengic told N1 that Bosnia’s biggest problem is the lack of perspective, which is why the people who already have a job are leaving Bosnia and that Bosnia needs a government which has a long-term plan that can show that things can change.  

Bosnia's general election will be held on October 7, when Bosnian citizens will elect the members of the state tripartite Presidency, entity presidents, as well as members of the state, entity and cantonal parliaments.