The Serb Democratic Party (SDS), an opposition party in the Bosnian Serb part of the country, is not satisfied with the October 7 election results, and the deputy head of the party told N1 on Tuesday that he would not object a coalition with the ruling Alliance of Independent Social Democrats (SNSD).
The SDS is part of the opposition Alliance for Victory coalition, which ran against the SNSD in Bosnia’s Serb-dominated semi-autonomous Republika Srpska (RS) entity.
The Alliance lost, both at the entity level and the state level. SNSD’s Zeljka Cvijanovic won the RS President seat, and party leader and hardliner Milorad Dodik won the Bosnian Serb seat in the tripartite state presidency.
Milovan Bjelica said that the election process was marked by “irregularities, spending of state funds by those in power, and media disinclination with this party (SDS).” All of this, he said, affected the election outcome.
Bjelica explained the stance of the regional SDS board he belongs to, the Sarajevo-Romanija region.
“Our stances are that Republika Srpska and the Dayton Peace Agreement (which ended the 1992-1995 war) must be cared for, the positioning of the SDS and maintaining unity within it, dialogue with all political parties in Republika Srpska and Bosnia and Herzegovina,” he said.
There is unity within the party and the success of the SNSD must be appreciated, Bjelica said. He said that Dodik has not called other political parties in the entity to negotiate coalitions, but only cooperation.
“When the final election results are published, we expect calls for negotiations from Zeljka Cvijanovic and Milorad Dodik,” he said.
Bjelica denied that there were any discussions on who is supporting a coalition with the SNSD at a recent hours-long session in the SDS, but said that it is in the interest of SDS mayors to have good relations with higher government levels within the RS.
“This is why we need to do all we can to communicate with other parties. This is why I am in favour of cooperation with them, including the SNSD,” he said.
