A session
of the Mostar City
Council is scheduled for today. The city budget is on this session’s agenda, along with other two other
very important
issues:  the Decision on the founding of the Urban Planning institution
and achieving consensus on the Internal
Organization Rulebook for Mostar City Administration.

Today is 24 May, and Mostar is the only major
municipality in BiH that has not adopted its 2006 budget. At the same time, the
systemization of the City Administration is still far from complete,
which is holding up
civil service appointments. In addition, the redundancy program has not been
adopted, leading to
additional expenses that will ultimately be borne by citizens. The single Urban Planning Institution has still not been formed. The
status of HTV has not been resolved, nor have the authorities demonstrated that
they have a clear vision with regard to the city’s cultural institutions.

The local
authorities must
understand that responsibility for completing
the unification process rests with them. Their failure to fulfil this
responsibility has created an untenable
situation  —
and the citizens of Mostar are suffering as a
result.

This City Council
session offers an opportunity for the
local authorities to
show that they are serious
about working on behalf of the citizens of Mostar, ahead of the emergency meeting that
the High Representative has convened with the presidents of the local
boards of the parties represented in the City Council, the City Council caucus
presidents, the Mayor and the
Council President, tomorrow
in Sarajevo.