Zoran Milanović circled Bosnia and Herzegovina: from Vitez and Mostar to Ljubuški, Livno, and Tomislavgrad. In doing so, he visibly enjoyed the freedom of his own expression, sending very direct messages about the political position of Croats in BiH, and at the expense of the ruling Bosniak policy: that ‘the right of Croats to elect their member of the Presidency has been stolen’, that they are ‘trying to push them out of the House of Peoples, which ensures the equality of the three constituent nations’, that ‘people who are obviously not Croats or lie that they are Croats come to the positions of representatives from the ranks of the Croatian people in the House of Peoples, elected by another ethnic group’, that this was initially ‘pickpocketing’, and now it is already ‘theft in broad daylight’.
He also stated that the issue of the constitutionality of nations ‘is not some sympathetic decor, but a question of the existence of Croats and the other two nations in BiH’. He was particularly inspired by attacks or objections to his messages. Thus, in response to the message from the Bosniak member of the Presidency, Šefik Džaferović, who in this case is the actual spokesperson for Izetbegović’s SDA, that he ‘behaves like an impolite guest in someone else’s house’ and that he ‘is becoming an increasing breeding ground for instability and rhetoric of divisions and insults’, President Milanović directly called the so-called Croatian member of the Presidency, Željko Komšić, elected by Bosniak votes, a ‘fraud’, and referred to Dejan Jović, who relativized his insistence on the constitutionality of Croats in BiH, as ‘the escort lady of Mr. Pupovac’.
Circumventing Sarajevo
However, behind these verbal bravuras of President Milanović, it was evident that his circular journey through Croatian areas in BiH was carefully prepared. He found a suitable political umbrella at the University of Mostar under which, as the Croatian president, he can work visit Herzegovina and Croatian enclaves in Bosnia while circumventing Sarajevo, which is the center and synonym of the political marginalization of Croats in the formally joint Federation of BiH. He did this at a very sensitive moment marking the anniversary of the Serbian genocide in Srebrenica, which usually passes under the sign of Serbian denial of genocide, and any crime after the conquest of Srebrenica, on which the Bosniak policy builds the image of the absolute and sole victim. Thus, all political conflicts in BiH are reduced to the Serbian-Bosniak conflict, which satisfies both sides.
In such a rather risky political context, President Milanović reminded BiH that the HV and HVO were the ones who prevented the repetition of Srebrenica in Bihać in the summer of 1995 and led to the Dayton Peace Agreement. He very directly warned of the problem of Bosniak political electoral engineering over Croats in the Federation. He did this at a moment when a new round of restructuring of BiH is being prepared, which will primarily focus on changes to the electoral law and necessary constitutional changes.
And despite his verbal calambours, Milanović has very consistently defended the Croatian interest in preserving the letter and spirit of the Dayton Agreement, which includes the constitutionality of the three nations, ensuring that at no point does he enter into topics of electoral law that could be interpreted as interference in the internal affairs of another state. Ahead of the process of new restructuring of BiH, Milanović clearly emphasized the Croatian position – the defense of the fundamental principles of the Dayton Agreement, including constitutionality. It is important that he received public support for such a position from Prime Minister Plenković, who has significantly greater foreign policy powers. In fact, precisely because of their ‘stylistic’ differences, Milanović and Plenković could be complementary in that process.
The Question of Sincerity and Consistency
In doing so, of course, the question of Milanović’s sincerity and political consistency necessarily arises. As Prime Minister, he not only openly supported his party ‘brother’, SDP’s Željko Komšić, who was then equally a ‘fraud’ as he is today, but he also led a highly ambiguous policy towards BiH: he opposed the Pelješac Bridge, pushing in collaboration with the Bosniak side the concept of a corridor (prevented by the EC), almost initiated the ratification of the border agreement between Tuđman and Izetbegović, based on Bosniak forgeries, and pushed Croatia into dependence on the Western Balkans ‘region’…
However, in the new division of roles and in the new process, this, as well as belonging to the political left, can become an advantage for him. In fact, if they manage to overcome personal animosities, President Milanović and Prime Minister Plenković have the opportunity to become protagonists (finally) of active Croatian politics towards the new restructuring of BiH and to take advantage of Croatia’s membership in NATO and the EU. If this step is missed – it was just another circular journey.
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