Bosnia and Herzegovina held general elections on Sunday, with around 3.4 million voters eligible to choose officials at several levels of government, including members of the country’s multiethnic, tripartite presidency. Voters also picked lawmakers for the federal parliament and leaders of institutions in the two largely autonomous entities. Polls closed at 7 p.m. local time (1700 GMT), and preliminary results were expected late Sunday.
A government divided along ethnic lines
The election unfolded as the economy slowed, progress toward European Union membership lagged and political gridlock persisted. Dominant ethnic parties in the two entities have repeatedly blocked decisions by the weak central government.
The Bosniak SDA, Serb SNSD and Croat HDZ BiH faced multi-ethnic opposition coalitions led by the Social Democratic Party. Voters selected representatives under a system that splits government responsibilities among a multiethnic central government, the self-governing neutral Brcko district and two semi-autonomous entities.
Those entities are the Muslim-Croat Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Serb-run Republika Srpska. Cantons and communities divide them further. The US-brokered 1995 Dayton Peace Accords established this framework along ethnic lines after the 1992-95 Bosnian war, which followed Yugoslavia’s breakup.
About half the population are Muslim Bosniaks, 31% are Orthodox Serb and 15% are Catholic Croat. The country has remained peaceful in recent years, but ethnonationalist parties have kept divisions alive. Voters have said they want to leave war-era rhetoric and division behind.
Separatism and competing visions
In Republika Srpska, SNSD secessionist leader Milorad Dodik remained influential despite not appearing on the ballot. He formerly served as president of the Serb-majority entity, and a conviction for defying the top international envoy overseeing the 1995 peace process bars him from public office for six years.
Dodik-backed Savo Minic was running for the entity’s presidency. Dodik seeks close ties with Serbia and Russia, and had recently returned from Moscow, where he met Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“Bosnia and Herzegovina is dead, it is an impossible country,” Dodik told supporters at his final rally in Banja Luka on Friday. The future and unity of the country stood at the center of the campaign.
In the Muslim-Croat federation, Bosniak parties called for a stronger central state. The SDA focused on keeping the country united against Serb separatism, while Bosnian Croats largely backed their ethnic parties, including the Bosnian branch of Croatia’s ruling conservative Croatian Democratic Union.
EU membership bid awaits reforms
Denis Becirovic, the incumbent Bosniak presidency member, pledged to renew the country’s path toward the EU and NATO. Bosnia and Herzegovina has held EU membership candidate status since 2022, but reforms must come before membership talks can begin.
The reforms include stronger judicial oversight and anti-corruption laws. The country faced slow progress toward EU membership and ongoing political gridlock among parties representing its different communities as voters went to the polls.