The SNSD Municipal Committee of Bosanski Petrovac has submitted a request to the Central Election Commission (CIK) of BiH to annul the local mayoral election in this municipality and hold new elections, with particular focus on certain polling stations, stated committee president Njemanja Davidovic.

“After the recount of votes for Bosanski Petrovac at the Main Counting Center in Sarajevo, the difference between the SDA candidate and our candidate is now four votes. I have not commented on this until now because we were preparing extensive documentation and arguments to support the request for annulling the election,” explained Davidovic.

Highlighting several inconsistencies, Davidovic told Srna that some ballots initially deemed invalid by the polling boards—where both SDA members and observers were present on election day—have now been counted as valid for the SDA candidate.

“The likelihood that SDA polling board members and observers on election day accepted that Mahmut Jukic would lose a vote is zero,” emphasized Davidovic.

He cited the example of the polling station in Suvaja, which has been a point of contention for the SDA.

“The polling board included Hasiba Ramic as president, Semira Hodzic representing the SDA, and Ivana Bulajic from the SNSD. Observers from both the SNSD and SDA were present, as well as two international observers with a translator. During the recount, the vote count for the SNSD’s candidate, Bobana Velagic Lipic, was reduced by one. If the recount is accurate, it would imply that the SDA observers and the two international observers, along with the translator, participated in reducing Jukic’s votes to give Velagic Lipic an inflated count, which is completely illogical,” explained Davidovic.

According to him, the recount revealed five ballots correctly marked for the SNSD candidate but missing a stamp or signature on the reverse side, thus rendering them invalid.

“Given the current margin of just four votes, or 0.13 percent of the electorate in Bosanski Petrovac, and considering the other arguments in our request, we believe it is justified to annul the election and hold a new one, in line with the CIK’s decision,” said Davidovic.

However, the Central Election Commission of Bosnia and Herzegovina (CIK BiH) today rejected SNSD’s request to annul the election in Bosanski Petrovac, deeming it inadmissible. The CIK stated that the request lacked sufficient grounds to initiate an annulment process, and that the evidence provided was not strong enough to justify overturning the election results.

To recap, initial results showed that the SNSD candidate, Bobana Velagic Lipic, narrowly defeated the SDA candidate, Mahmut Jukic, by one vote. The SDA requested a recount, which revealed that Jukic had a four-vote lead.