After refusing to participate in a debate ahead of the BiH elections organised by N1, Bakir Izetbegovic and Denis Becirovic, both running for the Bosniak seat in the tripartite State Presidency, showed up for a debate which was organised by the public broadcaster in the country’s Federation (FBiH) entity, FTV, the following day.
Three candidates for the post, Denis Becirovic, from the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Bakir Izetbegovic, from the Party of Democratic Action (SDA) and Mirsad Hadzikadic, from the Party for Progress, debated on Thursday and presented their plans for the future of the country.
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N1 invited the same candidates a day prior.
Izetbegovic refused the invitation. According to a statement from his office, he is not willing to participate in such debates on commercial TV stations. He is only willing to participate in debates organised by public broadcasters.
Becirovic did show up for the N1 debate briefly. He left the studio after a few minutes because Izetbegovic, whom he called “his only opposing candidate”, was not there.
“What did you, as the producer of the show, get as an explanation regarding why my only opponent for the post of member of the BiH Presidency is not here? It is known that polls show that this is a race between Bakir and me, although I respect Hadzikadic. I came tonight out of respect for you and the audience. He decided not to come. Unless he shows up, I’m leaving the studio. We are waiting for Bakir Izetbegovic!” Becirovic said before leaving.
The only candidate to remain in the studio was Hadzikadic, who went on to present his priorities and goals.
At the FTV debate on Thursday, Becirovic said he “prepared very seriously and responsibly” for the post in the BiH Presidency and that he believes he is one of the candidates who “very clearly and concretely” his work to the public.
“My program is very clear. The priority is to obtain EU candidate status as a country in the first six months. I believe that the Presidency must have a stabilizing factor in the coming period. It is time to start attracting investments in Bosnia and Herzegovina and provide people with a better perspective,” he said.
Izetbegovic said that the SDA put together a program for the next two mandates which is focused on five policies – “amendments to the Constitution and election law, rule of law, progress on the European and NATO path, economy, infrastructure.”
“We are at a crossroads; we are either going into the biggest post-Dayton Agreement crisis or into the biggest reconstruction process because the conditions have been created for the latter. I have two promises: We will raise the economy so that the standard of living will rise to a point where we will have 50 percent higher pensions and salaries at the end of the mandate, and that the departure of young people will be halved. I promised 100,000 jobs eight years ago and everyone said it was impossible. We created 102 thousand jobs,” he said.
Hadzikadic pointed out what happened at the N1 studio the day before.
“We are facing two similar interest policies, last night Becirovic showed what he thinks of the citizens. He ignored and insulted the man sitting next to him, called me “3-5 percent, irrelevant.” So everyone in this country is irrelevant to him. For him, only Bakir Izetbegovic is important. We have serious problems, we are facing an energy crisis soon,” he said.
He also presented his priorities.
“It is clear that everything that leads to NATO and EU membership is a priority. Visits to neighbours and a visit to Washington, an invitation to the President of the USA to visit Bosnia and Herzegovina. Another thing is energy sources, we are heading towards an energy crisis and we need to provide our people with a functional economy. I will do everything to stop the departure of people and involve the diaspora,” he said.
