All political debates in Bosnia should stop and focus should be put on the infrastructure development, Bosnia's Presidency Chairman Milorad Dodik said on Monday.

Addressing the opening of the Economic Forum 2019 in Sarajevo, Dodik said that “the predatory privatisation” destroyed the economic tissue of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and that consequently, the country failed to become a good competition at the regional and other markets.

“How good it was what we were doing, we can tell from the fact that we did not manage to employ the same number of people as we did before the war, that we're being left without a great number of young people who are leaving, which doesn't depend on us only but on the strategies of developed countries that seek the labour force in these territories,” said the Presidency Chairman.

It is necessary to reverse these processes and stop the departure of people to foreign countries for work.

“I think we should stop all political debates in Bosnia and Herzegovina and focus on collecting at least €3-5 billion in the next three years for the construction of infrastructure,” he added.

The forum based on the idea of establishing an open dialogue between the business community, academic sector and policy creators in the country is held for the third consecutive year.

Its organiser is the Sarajevo Faculty of Economics.

According to European Union Special Representative in Bosnia, Lars-Gunnar Wigemark, the economic situation is much better than it was four years ago and the country records a decent growth.

However, the citizens have not felt the benefits yet and the progress in many sectors is “frustratingly slow.”

In order to achieve full economic potential, the country needs a set of precise measures that the authorities would be following for the next few years.