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Southeast Europe
January 12, 2018 www.intellinews.com I Page 14
Outlawed Republic Day celebrations raise tensions in Bosnia
bne IntelliNews
Bosnia & Herzegovina’s Serb-dominated entity Republika Srpska held its biggest ever celebration of the controversial Republic Day on January 9. The Republic Day holiday — which has been banned by Bosnia’s state-level constitutional court — will inevitably raise tensions in Bosnia and most likely will be used by all parties in the election campaign this year.
Bosnian Serbs have frequently used the ques- tion of secession from Bosnia to gain more votes, while Bosniak parties will use the same issue to boost support from Muslims by raising the fear
of instability and clashes or even war. The same tactic has been used by nationalistic parties in the past and has successfully diverted people’s atten- tion from the high level of unemployment, poverty, lack of reforms and widespread corruption.
Despite the ban by the state-level constitutional court, the number of participants in Republic Day events reached around 1,800 people in addition to the crowds watching, according to daily Nezavisne Novine.
Republic Day marks the anniversary of the proc- lamation of the Republic of the Serb People of Bosnia & Herzegovina in 1992, shortly before
the outbreak of the Bosnian civil war. At the time Bosnian Serbs claimed their republic was part of Yugoslavia – rather than Bosnia, which had de- clared its independence the year before.
January 9 is also an Orthodox religious holiday, the Day of St Stephen, which is not observed by Catholic Croats or Muslim Bosniaks. In 2015, Bosnia’s constitutional court decided that the celebration of Republic Day in the entity contains elements of discrimination and should not be held until it meets the criteria of international legisla- tion for human rights.
Milorad Dodik, the president of Republika Srpska, once again demanded more autonomy for the Serb entity within Bosnia, and threatened to revive the idea of a referendum on independence.
“The Serb people have two states: Serbia and Republika Srpska, and we want to be one,” Balkan Insight quoted Dodik as saying.
In June, Dodik said that the entity will not hold a referendum on its independence in 2018 as ini- tially planned. He had previously said many times that the entity would hold an independence refer- endum in 2018, using this topic as a tool to raise his popularity and could use it once again ahead of this year’s general and presidential elections.
Former Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic, who received a decoration from Dodik, also weighed into the debate, controversially talking of inde- pendence for Republika Srpska and its potential unification with Serbia.
"If the road to our unification is your autonomy and independence, I wish you autonomy and independence, from the heart ... There will be another hundred obstacles, but we are merely those people who go ahead of the will of the people, and it is clear — Serbia and [Republika Srpska] will be deciding jointly about a joint destiny,” Nikolic said, B92 reported.
Neither of Serbia’s top officials — President Alek- sandar Vucic and Prime Minister Ana Brnabic — were present at the celebrations, and there have been calls for them to publicly distance them- selves from Nikolic, whose statements appeared to deny Bosnia’s territorial integrity.