BiH’s House of Reps adopts amendments to Election Law, pushing for new technologies and stronger oversight

The amendments were approved with 29 votes in favour and nine against. The proposal was put forward by lawmakers from the Party of Democratic Action (SDA).

The changes include provisions allowing the Central Election Commission (CEC) to modernise voter identification through new technologies, including the possible use of biometric data for voter authentication at polling stations. Under the amendments, the Central Voter Register could include fingerprints, photographs from identification documents and the validity dates of those documents, solely for identification purposes.

The law also introduces new rules on ballot validity. A ballot would be considered invalid if an optical scanner fails to recognise its QR code in the database, or, at polling stations without scanners, if the ballot is not signed by a member of the polling committee.

In addition, the amendments clarify procedures for electronic and manual vote counting, recounts and who is entitled to request a review of results.

Another key change removes the requirement for the Council of Ministers to approve job systematisation within the Central Election Commission, giving the CEC greater operational autonomy.

During the debate, lawmakers from several parties said the amendments were necessary to improve electoral integrity, although some criticised the use of an emergency procedure and questioned whether it was premature to legislate on technologies that have not yet been fully implemented.

After adopting the amendments, the House of Representatives also voted to forward the draft law to the House of Peoples, requesting that it be considered under the same urgent legislative procedure.