Bosnian citizen's legal battle exposes ethnic voting rights issue in EU court

As the six Western Balkan nations strive to join the European Union and pursue reforms laid out in a €6-billion EU growth plan, Bosnia and Herzegovina finds itself distracted by a landmark civil rights case that could upend its ethnic power-sharing system. 

Last year, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) ruled in favour of a complaint by Bosnian dignitary Slaven Kovačević against the Balkan country and said that its constitution violates human rights by “rendering ethnic representation more relevant than political, economic, social, philosophical and other considerations”. 

Bosnia appealed the ruling, and the hearing took place in Strasbourg last week. 

Could the verdict, which is not expected until 2025, ultimately spell the end of Bosnia’s tripartite presidency and institutions and act as a catalyst for the country’s EU accession talks?

Slaven Kovačević is a political scientist and an advisor to Željko Komšić, the Bosnian Croat member of the country's threeway presidency. Komšić is the head of the Democratic Front, a multi-ethnic liberal party that aims to abolish the barriers between the country’s peoples.

Kovačević’s legal complaint to the ECtHR said that he was constitutionally prevented from voting for the candidates of his choice in the 2022 general elections “due to a combination of the territorial and ethnic requirements.”

The ECtHR ruled that the “discriminatory treatment” of Kovačević was in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights, the sixth time since 2009 that the court has judged Bosnia’s constitution and election laws to have violated the global human rights treaty.

“I am clearly a victim of the provisions of the Bosnian constitution,” Kovačević told the court last week. “These provisions limit my