A Bosnia and Herzegovina court on 18 August rejected an appeal by the president of one of the country’s two autonomous entities, Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik, against the Central Election Commission’s decision to terminate his mandate.
The court’s decision is final and means that early elections for the Republika Srpska presidency must now be called within 90 days. The president will be elected for one year only, until October 2026, when Dodik’s current mandate should have ended.
In February, a court in Sarajevo sentenced Dodik in absentia to one year in prison and banned him from political activity for six years. Dodik was found guilty of ignoring the decisions of the Constitutional Court and the high representative of the world community, Christian Schmidt, who serves as Bosnia’s external leader. This position is mandated by the 1995 Dayton Accords for the peaceful resolution of the conflict in Bosnia. At Dodik’s request, the court commuted the prison term to a fine, but the decision to ban him from holding office is still in effect.
Dodik calls the judicial and political decisions against him an attack on Republika Srpska and says he will not allow early elections. The autonomy now finds itself in a state of constitutional crisis, as the Republika Srpska Prime Minister resigned at the same time as the court ruling. It is unclear who now has the authority to mandate the formation of a new government and who will fulfil the duties of the president. At present, the levers of power in the republic are still in the hands of Dodik.
The deprived president announced on 18 August that Republika Srpska would hold a referendum in late September to ask citizens whether or not they recognise his authority. The referendum decision is unlikely to be legally binding.
Milorad Dodik has a pro-Russian orientation and has visited Moscow on several occasions. He has repeatedly expressed support for Republika Srpska’s independence, but has not taken any practical actions that could be aimed at its secession from Bosnia and Herzegovina.