Nothing new on the domestic political scene: in less than two weeks before 2026, one thing is absolutely certain – we will certainly not get the budget for the institutions of BiH and international obligations for the next year, which means that we will go to temporary financing again.
Although the law is clear and has prescribed deadlines for the adoption of the law on the budget, those who make the legal decisions will violate them again.
What does the law say?
The rules are prescribed in detail: The Council of Ministers is obliged to submit to the Presidency of BiH the Draft Law on the budget of BiH institutions and international obligations of BiH for the following year, no later than October 15 of the current year.
The Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina is obliged to submit the Budget Law Proposal for the following year to the Parliamentary Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina by November 1 of the current year.
The Parliamentary Assembly of BiH should consider the Proposal of the Law on the Budget submitted by the Presidency of BiH, and in accordance with its own rules of procedure, adopt the Law on the Budget by December 31 of the current year.
If the BiH Parliamentary Assembly does not adopt the law on the budget before the beginning of the fiscal year, funding will be temporary until that law enters into force. Certainly, there is nothing of that in the next few weeks, which means that breaking the deadlines is quite certain, and thus temporary financing.
Asim Mujkić, a professor at the Faculty of Political Sciences in Sarajevo, says that the situation regarding the non-adoption of the budget is repeated. He believes that this situation will change when we are led by political elites who will turn to the real needs of their voters.
“When we have, in the true sense, responsible political elites, we will be able to expect that key things, such as the budget, will be adopted on time,” Mujkić points out.
A paradox on stage
According to him, we have the paradox that those who are in charge of ensuring compliance with the law are the first to break those laws.
“Admittedly, they justify it in the following way: he does not act as an individual who would eventually be sanctioned, but acts as a ‘representative of his people’. There we have a linguistic catch, which allows the ‘defenders of vital national interests’ to never be the ones individually who should be sanctioned, but behind them is the whole nation, and you cannot put the people on the dock,” Mujkić told “Nezavisne novine”.
The professor added, ordinary people in this country know that: that political elites hide behind the people.
“I don’t know what else would need to happen, so that we finally give up on such policies. I think we are getting close to that, because this amount of absurdity can only be resolved by some major change, and I hope that it will be a change in the political paradigm,” Mujkić pointed out.
A dysfunctional orchestra
Danijal Hadžović, a journalist from Sarajevo, emphasizes that the failure to adopt the budget reflects the complete irresponsibility of politicians.
“On the one hand, you have the fact that it is a dysfunctional orchestra from the very beginning. They did not agree on a basic common language regarding the key challenges that BiH is facing. And on the other hand, these are very irresponsible and careless individuals in themselves, who even if they have a minimum of consensus, and who do not, often even when they need to do something within their competence, they do not do it, or they do not do it on time and then it goes on indefinitely,” says Hadžović.
At the same time, he adds, the people are used to such things, they are preoccupied with their lives and their problems.
“The people do not think about the budget, even though they see that they are not doing their job. The citizens do not see how they can influence it to make them move and do anything. It is a state of lethargy where the people have simply resigned themselves to their fate,” Hadžović emphasized in a statement for “Independent newspaper“.
By the way, we have been witnessing a similar scenario for years and we had a “replay” recently. On November 20 of this year, the House of Peoples of BiH adopted the Law on the Budget of Institutions and International Obligations of BiH for 2025.
The budget, which amounts to 1.5 billion, was adopted with 10 votes “for” and four “abstentions”. No one was against it. The budget law was adopted in the House of Peoples in the same text as in the House of Representatives. This completed the procedure of his adoption, after numerous vicissitudes recorded in the previous months.
