Nezavisne novine: BANJALUKA – Municipal mayors in the Republic of Srpska will still be elected directly at the elections, after the Government, faced with resistance of the international community, yesterday withdrew the proposal for abolishment of direct election.
The Government of the RS yesterday morning at the session, before the session of the parliament of the RS, withdrew the proposed changes of the Law on Local Self Governance and the Election Law, which stipulated that the decision on election of the mayor is left to the majority in the local parliament.
Milorad Dodik, the prime minister of the RS, said that the Government decided to withdraw the changes of the laws after talks with Mark Perinne de Brichambaux, the secretary general of the OSCE Mission.
“We did that so there would not be any negative reports by the OSCE and so the Government would not be said that something is being broken”, said Dodik. He repeated that they wanted by changing the laws to solve the problems in functioning of the local structures of governance, which were being faced with frequent blockages and recalls of mayors, because of confrontations between the assembly majority and the mayor.
-Zoran Lipovac, minister of administration and local self governance of the RS, said that by this autumn, when the local elections are being held, there will be no new Government initiatives for changes of the related laws.
“That means that the mayors will be elected as until now, by direct method”, said Lipovac.
Centres of Civil Initiatives (CCI), one of numerous NGOs which does not like the expeditiousness of entering the changes of the election system, welcomed the withdrawal of the Law and expressed the hope that in the future there would be less and less laws to enter the procedure by urgent procedure.
Igor Stojanović, director of development of the CCI, estimated that the Government, by this decision respected the standpoints of the public and the citizens, who are against the urgent adoption of such changes of the election system.