STARI GRAD, NOVO SRAJEVO, TRNOVO, TUZLA, VLASENICA – When you analyze everything, turn it around, compare numbers, statistics, various forecasts, the biggest surprise and one can say, unfortunately, that the winner of the local elections in BiH is Ibro Berilo, the new – old mayor of the municipality Trnovo.
We also analyzed the municipalities of Stari Grad, Novo Sarajevo, Tuzla and Vlasenica. At the head of the municipality, only one change. But let’s go in order.
Stari Grad Sarajevo: Persuasive Čengić
SDP candidate Irfan Cengić declared victory in the race for mayor of Sarajevo’s Stari Grad municipality. His opponent was Dženan Selimbegović from the SDA, as well as in the previous extraordinary elections in this municipality.
– Thank you guys for your trust and another convincing victory. By the will of the people, I continue to serve the Old Town. We ran a clean, positive campaign, a campaign about the future, about the Old Town, about us, not others. In the campaign, I talked about what was done and the plans for the next four years, which we will start implementing from tomorrow – said Čengić.
He stated that he proved “that you can win only with work and contact with people. I didn’t have a single interview, guest appearance, statement, debate, podcast, reaction or appearance in the media”.
– I did not talk about opponents because they are not worth mentioning. Once again they showed that they are bad politicians and even worse people, which the people of Stari Grad recognized – he added.
By the way, Čengić is, it can be said, the new – the old mayor of this Sarajevo municipality, which he became the head of in November 2023 after the previous longtime mayor was recalled. Ibrahim Hadžibajrić.
By the way, this year’s local elections were the first in which Hadžibajrić, who ruled the municipality for decades, could not run.
He is in custody on charges of organized crime and is still in custody.
During the summer, based on the first-instance verdict of the Municipal Court in Sarajevo (criminal offense of violation of rights in the employment relationship), he was sentenced to six months in prison and banned from holding the position of mayor for 4 years. Thus, the career of one of the longest-serving chiefs in Bosnia and Herzegovina received its (first) judicial epilogue.
Thousands of pages have already been written about abuses, crime, and corrupt practices of the former mayor of Stari Grad, and Interview.ba is in the text “SKY DESCENT OVER THE OLD TOWN: Hadžibajrić’s path from tradition to prison” specifically dealt with the results of the “Start” action.
Hadžibajrić was arrested in the operation, which was carried out in May last year, and together with him, more than ten natural and legal persons are charged with organized crime and abuse in the amount of millions. A warrant has been issued for two people.
So Cengić has a lot of work ahead of him. First of all, on the rehabilitation of the dangers that threaten the residents of the settlement on the entity line at the foot of Trebević.
Literally, the polling stations had not even closed, and unfortunately the victims of the unprecedented floods in Jablanica were still being searched for.
These days, the “ball” is being played with statements and decisions with the Sarajevo Cantonal Administration of Civil Protection, which on Friday November 1 at dusk issued an order for the urgent evacuation of the residents of Širokača. Čengić claims that he did not know about this decision. He spent the night with the agitated locals.
Novo Sarajevo: Narrow victory for Benjamina Karić
An interesting battle was fought between the candidate SDP-and Benjamine Karić i candidate of the Party for BiH Muamer Bandić.
The victory was won by the current mayor Karić thanks to slightly less than 2 percent of the voters who chose her.
On election night, Karić and the SDP decided to promptly declare victory, albeit with sour faces and unconvincing expressions. Some who were at the SDP headquarters at that moment claim that at that moment there were no arguments to declare victory.
In the end, apparently, the voting body of the third candidate, also a returnee, decided Nedzada Koldzewho instead of the SDA, whose head he was in several mandates, ran this time on behalf of the Naprijed BiH party.
In Novi Sarajevo, the good success of the candidate of the Party for Bosnia and Herzegovina and the fact that Benjamina Karić did not win so smoothly is a particular surprise.
According to analysts, her campaign was controversial for several reasons. She was at an advantage because she visited schools and kindergartens, made promises and brought donations as mayor.
– I will be completely honest when it comes to the candidacy for mayor of Novi Sarajevo. The responsibilities of the municipality are much broader, and the budget is twice as large as the budget of the City of Sarajevo. We all know that the mayor’s position is much more “concrete” in terms of field work, it is more operational, simply put – my hands are “freed” for projects in the municipality, which I believe has a lot of potential, but also numerous long-term unresolved issues – she said before the election.
After the election, she promised to do everything to close Wilson’s Promenade to traffic, to make Novo Sarajevo the cleanest municipality in Sarajevo, to continue with the renovation of facades and the expansion of parking spaces. A new pedestrian bridge will be built behind the “Omer Masić” DZ, and the Ars Aevi bridge will be repaired, the southern stand of the Grbavica stadium will be built, and the utility network will be repaired.
During her mandate, the promises state, every settlement will have water, electricity and sewerage.
She promised the construction of new kindergartens, playgrounds, renovation of schools, and construction of the long-promised school in Pofalići.
Dr. Hasan Tanovićwho led the municipality for the previous four years, lost the trust of the Troika, whose candidate he was, during his mandate and decided to return to his work as an orthopedist. He is no longer in politics.
Trnovo: You can’t be the chief
Orilo – gorilla, opet Ibro Berilo, we wrote before the election.
The candidate of the Democratic Action Party received the results in custody, due to suspicion of organized corruption and crime.
He convincingly defeated SDP’s opponent Bajru Lindova. Berilo won 78.23 percent of the vote.
On November 2, Berilo was released from detention after three months, just like her assistant Nađa Milišićand the owner to the owner of the company Lok-pil doo Adis Mulaosmanović.
Together with them, Edina Džigal was arrested in the “Incitat” action, and was given a restraining order.
The trio who were in custody are suspected of organized corruption in the construction sector and money laundering, as well as of conspiring to commit criminal acts, namely abuse of position or authority and money laundering.
Berilo is suspected of changing regulatory plans with municipal associates in favor of investors in order to build facilities in Bjelašnica, on state land that is under a temporary ban on disposal, and in return received gifts abusing his position.
But that is only the tip of the iceberg in the abuses attributed to Beryl.
In the action, five apartments and a multimillion-dollar parking lot in Bjelašnica were confiscated, and we also mention the subdivision of land, fairy tales about the construction of the Buroj settlement, the devastation of the forest, ruling the municipality as if he had inherited it from his ancestors.
All this did not affect the voters in Trnovo, who voted and elected him again.
But, apparently, Berilo will not (at least for now) return to the mayor’s office.
– Until the final decision of the Supreme Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ibro Berilo cannot perform the function of mayor of Trnovo – stressed his lawyer Senad Pizović.
Tuzla: Lugavic has certainly confirmed his mandate
The victory of the new – old mayor, SDP candidate Zijad Lugavić in Tuzla, analysts will agree, is not a big surprise.
“Red” Tuzla has been headed by a leftist candidate of the Social Democratic Party for decades, and Lugavić confirmed his mandate this time.
We remind you that in one mandate, Tuzla was led by a long-time mayor Jasmin Imamovićwho in November 2022, just two years after winning a new (sixth consecutive) mandate, decided to withdraw from the position in favor of a representative position in the state Parliament.
As his successor, first as acting president, Imamović left the previous assistant for economic development, entrepreneurship and agriculture, Zijad Lugavić, who won the most votes in early elections.
Analysts point out that Lugavic has yet to prove himself. The half term he inherited was not an opportunity for that. According to fellow journalists, more was said about the legacy of Jasmin Imamović.
– It’s not easy for Lugavic. He is a diligent and hardworking man, but it would not be easy for anyone after Imamović. So many years of rule left their mark on many people, circumstances, and events. What is now being said around Tuzla is that Imamović is not helping Lugavić too much. What more. Allegedly, he is doing everything to make it difficult for him to work through his people that he left in the City. Imamović will not allow anyone to be better than him – a colleague told us before the election.”
In this year’s election race, Lugavić as a SDP candidate received the support of: Tuzla Alternative, Narod i Pravde, Social Democrats of BiH, BiH Greens, Bosnian People’s Front, PDA and an independent candidate Nedžad Jusić.
Among other things, he said:
“Our goal is for Tuzla to continue developing as a city for the new age – open, smart, safe, creative and full of life.”
Lugavič’s biggest competitor was Zoran Blagojević from the SDA, who won slightly more than 20.01 percent of the vote. Dervish Čičko from the Party for BiH had 4.04 percent of the votes, and SNSD’s candidate Tihomir Mihajlović only 0.60 percent of voters’ trust.
Lugavic won 31,372 or 75.36 percent of the votes. Enough to confirm the confidence of the people of Tuzla.
Vlasenica: Kraljević is the mayor for the third time
Miroslav Mićo Kraljevićwho is being tried in the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina for the most serious war crimes, won his third mandate as the head of Vlasenica.
Kraljević won with 55.03 percent of the votes against his opponent, SDS Celebrating Mazić.
This outcome did not surprise almost anyone, because, according to experts, Kraljević is one of the favorite tycoons of the President of the RS Milorad Dodik.
He is obviously also loved by the residents of Vlaseni, who have given him their trust for the third time despite the fact that dissidents are leaving the city, and those who remain remain silent so as not to be targeted by the mayor.
Firefighters who paid dearly for their rebellion know this. First, the unit was disbanded last year, and those who remained were fired after refusing to support SNSD political rallies. whom Kraljević faithfully serves.
The media recorded several cardinal mistakes that Kraljević made with public money. Well, to mention only a few – the incinerator he started is still pending. The Ski Center of Igrišta becomes a symbol of decay, the choice of favorite contractors for construction in the city.
But Kraljević, on the other hand, is very successful in running a private business – a sawmill, and also as one of the founders of the agricultural cooperative “Zdravo” from Vlasenica. It is still being investigated whether the Cooperative received the use of agricultural land for free.
Source: capital.ba
