The Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH) entity’s Finance Minister Jelka Milicevic told N1 that if the FBiH ends up dissatisfied with the distribution of excise revenues, then the Law should be abolished altogether. She refuses to make the distribution of these funds into a political issue.

“If we already burdened the citizens with additional BAM 0.25 (EUR 0.13) for these revenues, then we have no right to block those funds. I feel ever closer to the idea that if this situation lasts for much longer, I will suggest that we abolish the Excise Tax Law if the FBiH ends up dissatisfied. I think that would be a more honest solution than the present one. This issue was returned to the Indirect Taxation Authority’s (ITA BiH) Management Board, but it needs to be resolved through the Law (on Excise Tax),” she said.

“We have our own arguments that say we are right, and the Republika Srpska (RS) entity has its own as does the ITA BiH for its own position on this,” Milicevic added.

According to the current, temporary, regulation on the distribution of funds collected through excise taxes, 90 percent of the total revenues are divided into three parts: 59 percent goes to the FBiH, 39 percent to the RS and 2 percent to the Brcko District. Ten percent always remains on the account in case of some unforseen situations. This decision was adopted in 2009 by the ITA BiH.

Estimates from the FBiH say that FBiH sells a lot more fuel than the 59 percent they receive. Therefore ITA BiH’s members from the FBiH were against this form of distribution of future revenues. 

Earlier this month, the ITA BiH Management Board reached an agreement after several months of standstill, concerning the distribution of BAM 165.2 million of revenues between the two entities and the District. The FBiH side was visibly dissatisfied with the distribution of revenues after the ITA BiH session.