- Prosecutor’s Office of BiH refuses to disclose whether it is investigating OFAC’s allegations of high officials’ involvement in corruption
- Information on the Prosecutor’s Office of BiH’s actions in the case of the HJPC Secretariat Director is refused to be disclosed
- TI BiH files lawsuits over disputed decisions of the Appeals Council at the Council of Ministers of BiH
Transparency International in BiH has filed a lawsuit due to the denial of access to information on the actions of the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina regarding the findings of the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) of the US Treasury Department on the involvement of numerous high-ranking BiH officials in corruption. The lawsuit was filed against the decision of the Appeals Council at the Council of Ministers of BiH, which justified the decision of the Prosecutor’s Office of BiH to deny public access to this information.
We remind that the OFAC statement presented serious allegations of involvement of numerous high officials and an entire network of private companies in corruption and embezzlement of public funds, but the public still has no information on whether the competent institutions have investigated these allegations.
What is particularly problematic is that the Prosecutor’s Office, which was obligated to deliver the decisions of the Appeals Council to TI BiH within 5 days, failed to do so for a full eight months, and the case was resolved only after this information became public. This unnecessarily prolonged the initiation of administrative disputes before the Court of BiH, which would have already been concluded if they had been initiated on time.
The Prosecutor’s Office of BiH justified withholding information related to persons on OFAC’s blacklists by stating that it is not obligated to answer questions but rather to “provide ready-made information available in written or any other form“, even though this information is of public interest and clearly under the control of the Prosecutor’s Office. In an almost identical case, TI BiH requested information on the investigation of corruption crimes in the case of HJPC Secretariat Director Admir Suljagić, but the Prosecutor’s Office of BiH also refused to provide this information as well as the decision of the Appeals Council, which led to a delayed administrative dispute before the Court of BiH.
It is particularly alarming that the new Law on Freedom of Access to Information in BiH, which was presented as “progress on the European path,” does not provide any sanction in its misdemeanor provisions for failing to deliver the decision of the second-instance body to the appellant.
In the week marking the International Day for Universal Access to Information, TI BiH reminds institutions that their work is public and that transparency is the foundation of citizens’ trust in the system. Therefore, the aforementioned actions of the Prosecutor’s Office of BiH and numerous other institutions do not contribute to building such trust.
We also remind of the example where TI BiH initiated an administrative dispute in a procedure where the Ministry of Justice of BiH refused to provide access to the Draft Law on the Court of BiH, with the explanation that it could “seriously undermine the very determination of the law proposal“.
Although it is the Ministry’s obligation to make the process of adopting such an important law transparent, in this case too, the Appeals Council rejected TI BiH’s appeal, claiming that the draft of this law had gone through the e-consultation process, even though a completely different law was on the e-consultation portal, namely the Draft Law on Courts in BiH, and not the Draft Law on the Court of BiH, which was on the agenda of the 43rd session of the Council of Ministers of BiH.
Such conduct by institutions that should ensure complete and timely availability of information of public importance certainly undermines public trust in their work. We remind that the right to access information is a fundamental human right, which allows citizens to oversee the work of institutions and ensure the accountability of those elected to represent them.
