The announced changes to the Law on Police Officers of BiH, which would allow police officers at the state level to continue working until the age of 60 even after completing 40 years of service, are shaking the public more than the proponents in the House of Representatives of the PSBiH and those who asked them to do so had expected.
Because it turns out that “solving the lack of police personnel” with this law is just a colorful lie, and that behind the whole story there are much more mundane motives. Preservation of armchairs, a position of power, a salary of four to five thousand marks and privileges that the leading police officers do not want to let go at any price.
Complaints delay retirement
Originally, it was foreseen the possibility of remaining in the service until the age of 65, but a “softened” solution was proposed, it was proposed to enable the work of police officers who should retire until the age of 60.
As the Report learns, such a proposal was delivered yesterday to the Speaker of the House of Representatives of the PSBiH Marinko Čavara, and it was sent to the procedure under the urgent procedure.
And as it turns out more and more, because of a few high-ranking officials in police agencies, whose pensions are knocking on their doors.
The proposers, MPs Predrag Kojović (NS), Nihad Omerović (NiP) and Jasmin Imamović (SDPBiH), clearly did not sufficiently scratch the surface of the data that those who would work after retirement submitted to them.
Because, instead of solving the problem of the lack of police officers, these changes would bring benefits mainly to the management staff in police agencies, for whom this is the perfect mechanism to retain power and salaries, which in their case are often twice as high as their future pensions.
At the same time, high-ranking officers in police agencies who meet the conditions for retirement would stop the advancement of younger staff.
The report spoke to sources from three police agencies, the State Investigation and Protection Agency (SIPA) of the Border Police and the Directorate for the Coordination of Police Bodies.
All interlocutors, understandably, insisted on anonymity. And they all claim the same thing. The number of police officers in the rank of those who are missing the most and who want to stay working after attaining the conditions for retirement is negligible.
The reason is simple. The largest number of police officers who are about to retire have salaries of 1,500 to 1,800 KM, and their pensions in FBiH amount to the same amount. Why would anyone work for a salary equal to a pension?
The survey results of the SIPA Trade Union further confirmed this. Out of 379 respondents, as many as 369 declared against the adoption of amendments to the Law. Only ten of them were in favor.
But that’s why management staff, from chief inspectors to directors, can’t wait for the changes to be adopted.
This is best seen in the fact that, according to the claims of Raport’s sources, the Committee for Complaints of Police Officers is flooded with complaints about retirement decisions, mostly from management staff in police agencies at the BiH level.
Among them, as confirmed to the Report, are two SIPA chief inspectors who have already received decisions on retirement, but do not want to retire, because they have to say goodbye to a salary of about 5,000 KM and other numerous privileges.
Although the current law clearly stipulates that they have acquired the conditions for retirement and that the Board would reject their appeals, they are in fact ‘buying time’ until the existing law is changed and they are trying to hold on to their seats until those changes come into force, because the law was sent for adoption under an urgent procedure.
At the same time, our sources claim, those who complained to the Police Officers’ Complaints Committee are looking forward to the fact that the SNSD is blocking the sessions of the BiH Council of Ministers whose agenda includes the appointment of the Committee, because it means more time to realize their dream.
Namely, until the Board decides on their appeals, regardless of the fact that they have received decisions on retirement, they have the right to work and receive a salary.
In the meantime, they hope that the changes to the law will come into force and that instead of this one, they will retire on December 31, 2028. year, by which time the application of the changes to the law is prescribed by the new proposal.
Because the amendments to the law, if adopted, provide that if one of the police officers is already in the process of retirement, the manager will be able to suspend the retirement procedure by means of a by-law.
Bosniaks loyal to Ćulum cannot maintain the national balance
This is precisely what one of the chief inspectors in SIPA, who is a Bosniak, is counting on. He has received a decision on retirement, but he expects that according to the amended law, if it is adopted, Darko Ćulum will leave him in the chair until 2028.
Because he also did Ćulum a favor and did nothing to arrest Milorad Dodik, Nenad Stevandić and Radovan Višković when they were fugitives from the judiciary.
Namely, that chief inspector was expected, given his rank and position, to at least present a plan or the possibility of action by SIPA in that direction, and after Darko Ćulum defected from it in March.
Our sources see the reason for the passivity of that official in SIPA in the fact that Ćulum hired his daughter, who was among 10 police officers who support changes to the law that allow her father to remain in the chair after retirement. Now he hopes that after the changes to the law, Ćulum will allow him to stay in SIPA.
However, those advocating changes to the Law also justify it by the need for Bosniaks to remain in police agencies at the BiH level even after retirement, so as not to disturb the national balance and to prevent the alleged endangerment of the numerous status of Bosniaks.
And, realistically, we are talking about Bosniaks in leadership positions who are in fact suitable for Ćulum and Dodik and they showed that in such a way that not a single voice of the Bosniak leadership staff was heard either from SIPA or from any other police agency while the attack on the constitutional order continued.
By allowing those Bosniaks to keep their positions, the advancement of other Bosniaks who do not have the opportunity to show themselves and prove themselves is prevented.
Of course, the process of advancement will also be stopped because of those positions in which both Serbs and Croats who have acquired the conditions for retirement will remain.
If the changes to the law pass, everyone who, for example, wanted to apply for an internal competition for one of the management positions, will have to forget about promotion until the old staff retire at the end of 2028, if that deadline is not extended in the meantime.
Conveniences for Ćulum, Kuprešaković, Knežević…
According to our sources, there are at most between 30 and 40 of them in all three police agencies at the BiH level, including directors and deputies, who also agree with the adoption of this law.
First of all, it suits Darko Ćulum, who has already met the requirements for retirement, but with the support of Dodik and the SNSD, he continues to hold the position of director, despite the numerous illegalities he commits, including unjustly absenting himself from his position for four months, which he left at the invitation of the secessionist Dodik, thereby joining the attack on the constitutional order.
However, some of Ćulum’s high-ranking associates from among the Bosniaks did not want to hold a grudge against him all those months, so they regularly maintained communication and drank coffee with him, and now he will return the favor, because after retirement, if the law is passed, he will leave them in the position.
Because the proposal to amend the law foresees that the heads of police agencies determine who will remain to work in the agencies after obtaining the conditions for retirement.
We also learn that the changes to the law will also favor HDZ’s Mirko Kuprešaković, director of the Border Police, who can also be classified as one of Dodik’s helpers at the time when he was on the run with Višković and Stevandić, and at the same time often crossed Bosnia and Herzegovina. a border that he allegedly neither saw nor knew.
Namely, the changes in the law will enable Kuprešaković to appear again as a candidate for the director of the Border Police in March 2027, although he would not be able to do so under the current provisions of the law.
In that case, Kuprešaković would not be ‘hanged’ by the deadline of December 2028 for retirement, because appointed persons can bring the mandate to an end, which means that Kuprešaković would remain in the position until 2031.
If the changes to the law are adopted, it will also dawn on HDZ’s Đura Knežević, who has already met the conditions for retirement, but the position of deputy director of DKPT saved him from saying goodbye to the chair until the end of this term, and now he is “smiling” for a new mandate, if the changes to the law are adopted, because it is unlikely that HDZBiH will give him up as a loyal staff member.
How many police officers are really retiring and how many will be employed
Also, our sources point out, in the bill it is stated that the occupancy of police agencies at the BiH level is 50 percent, which they say is not true.
They point out that SIPA is filled with 75 percent of capacity, DKPT with 65 percent, while in the Border Police that percentage is 50 percent because on 1.10. a new rulebook was adopted that prescribed 450 new executors.
They say that everyone is talking about the retirement of 250 police officers in the GP BiH next year, but no one mentions that it will be successive, and that on March 1 next year, the GP BiH will receive 150 police officers, in the next six months another 150, and that they have been approved for the employment of another 150 police officers.
This means, say our sources, that the Border Police can receive 500 people in a year and a half starting from March next year.
After all, say our sources, why is there an insistence on urgently filling the capacity of police agencies, which since their inception have never reached over 75 percent occupancy, and there were also more critical situations, such as the migrant crisis, so no such solution was proposed as today.
This, they point out, is precisely because of the current directors and chief inspectors in police agencies that someone wants to keep in their positions as long as possible at all costs, because they are mostly party people and their henchmen from all nations, who will not do anything even when their boss tramples on the laws and the constitution, but will protect their chair.
Such a scenario best suits SNSD and HDZ BiH who have their own people in such positions in the police agencies and their own worthy Bosniaks, of whom, as we saw during the constitutional and security crisis, they did not lift a finger to arrest Dodik or to resent Ćulum, who today supports their stay in SIPA even after they have met the conditions for retirement.
That is why it turns out that changes in the law bring the most benefits to those who helped Dodik.
Therefore, if the Parliament of Bosnia and Herzegovina really wants to help the police agencies solve the shortage of police officers in a way that will extend the working life of those who need to retire by three years, then let them leave out of this possibility the leading police officers and limit it only to the missing police officers.
Because there is no shortage of management staff in any police agency. The police officers in the field would say that there are too many of them and that they “collide” in the offices, he writes Report.
