Government

The Brčko District Government is addressed in Chapter III, Section C, of the Statute. The Government shall be governed by a Mayor (Articles 46, 47 et seq.), elected by the Assembly. The District Government Departments are provided for in Article 47, paragraph 2. The Heads of Departments (Article 48) shall be selected or dismissed by the Mayor based on professional criteria. Every employee of the Government is expected to perform their functions with diligence and dedication. Ethical obligations are regulated in the Code of Conduct of Government employees.³⁶⁴⁰ In addition, a similar legal act³⁶⁴¹ exists for all employees within the authorities of the Brčko District, including the Government. Just as this act applies to all Councillors of the Assembly, so does the obligation to avoiding conflicts of interest (Article 52) applies to the employees of the Government, especially those in leadership positions. The Mayor is responsible for the entire District Government (Article 50). Within the framework of the Mayor’s policy-making powers, each Head is responsible for the professional performance of duties within the Department (Article 51). Articles 53-57 regulate the relations between the Assembly and the Government, i.e., the election and resignation or removal from office of the Mayor, discussing financial reports, etc.

The most important procedural regulations were adopted soon after the establishment of the District, although many of them were amended several times, e.g., the Law on Public Government of the Brčko District,³⁶⁴² the Law on Administrative Procedure of the Brčko District,³⁶⁴³ the Law on Enforcement Procedure³⁶⁴⁴ etc. All administrative decisions are deliberated on by the legal service, and all appeals or complaints by the Appeals Commission.³⁶⁴⁵ The Revenue Agency (Article 42) is directly responsible to the Assembly. Naturally, the Government relies on the Assembly when it comes to the budget plan (Article 43, paragraph 2).

Considering the priority given to safety and order, the entire Chapter IV of the Statute was devoted to the Brčko District Police. The Chief of Police and Deputies shall be appointed and dismissed by the Mayor with the consent of the Assembly (Articles 60, 34). The police deals on its own with the issue of disciplinary offences; the Police Commission is the second instance.³⁶⁴⁶ In the event of a pursuit of criminal suspects (Article 61), the District Police and the Entities’ Police Authorities shall cooperate in enforcing the law. Persons with a criminal record were banned from discharging any public office in the Brčko District.³⁶⁴⁷ In a rather thorough analysis of the legal system, the Brčko District Law Revision Commission drafted the most significant bills in relation to different administrative areas, and introduced them to the Assembly.³⁶⁴⁸ These involved, first, the extremely difficult issues of unifying the education system, in particular of the school system, in ethnic, regional and religious terms, then the issues of economic, labour, social welfare and healthcare laws,³⁶⁴⁹ and land- registry law, the law on enterprises and bankruptcy proceedings.