Mehmed Bradarić, a legislator with the state Parliament’s House of Peoples, requested in May a list of civil servants and office holders in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) institutions who are entitled to accommodation allowances. The BiH Council of Ministers prepared the list for the next session scheduled for July 19, 2012.

Bradarić told CIN that he asked for the records because of allegations that all some of the beneficiaries do not live at the reported addresses. He said he’ll make a statement at the next session after he analyzes the list.

According to the records, among those claiming allowances worth 400 KM were Dragan Vrankić, a former state minister of finances and treasury and Nikola Špirić, the chairman of the BiH Council of Ministers. Vrankić is registered as domiciled in Čapljina, even though he resides at the street of Ivan Zovko in Mostar. Špirić claims the allowance because he officially lives with his family in Banja Luka, even though he owns an apartment in Sarajevo at the Olimpijska Street.

In Dec 2010, the Center for Investigative Reporting published a story in which it warned that some members of the state parliament report fake addresses to claim allowances including the costs of commuting with a private car. Among those where the then members of the state parliament Ivo Miro Jović and Zoran Koprivica.

The Parliament’s financial department pays compensations for use of private vehicles based on information MPs provide. No one checks mileage and the deparment officials say they are not authorized to do that.

According to the Agency for Civil Service in BiH, the accommodation allowance is calculated based on the guidelines from the 2002 Resolution on the Calculation of Salaries and Other Material Rights of the Employees for the BiH Council of Ministers, BiH Ministries and the other BiH Council of Ministers’ institutions and bodies. The resolution allows the reimbursement for temporary accommodation and the costs of living away from home to a chairperson of the Council of Ministers, ministers, deputy ministers and senior civil servants of the Council of Ministers. BiH Ministries and the other BiH Council of Ministers’ institutions and bodies.

Civil servants who are not in a position of seniority are not entitled to these allowances. However, the Dec 2011 lists features also some of them.