The Minister of Communications and Transport of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Edin Forto, earns around 5,700 BAM per month. Nearly five years before taking up the ministerial position, he earned up to 3,700 BAM as the Prime Minister of the Sarajevo Canton.
Minister Forto does not find these amounts excessively high, as he earned more in directorial positions in the private sector than in politics.
“It’s unpopular to say, but I moved from a better salary to the public sector. I had better earnings,” Forto told CIN, referring to the period from 2013 to 2015 when he worked as a director at the NEXE Group.
Although his earnings in public positions have increased in recent years, Forto did not buy new properties. He used to engage in property flipping with properties he purchased through loans, but he no longer does that. “I had a lot of loans, but I repaid them all,” he said.
Minister Forto lives in Sarajevo with his wife and two children in an apartment he inherited from his parents. According to his estimates, this property is worth 250,000 BAM. He also owns 2,350 square meters of land in the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which he believes is worth 587,000 BAM.
Forto has declared the same properties ever since he entered politics. In addition to these, he owns a Renault Kadjar vehicle worth 37,000 BAM and shares in companies Feroelektro, Konjuh, and Zrak. Together with his wife, he has savings of 50,000 BAM in UniCredit Bank.
According to Forto, the earnings of officials at the state level are “great”, but he believes that ministers and prime ministers in cantonal governments, who “work ten hours a day for the salary of a middle manager in a corporation,” are not adequately compensated.
“I’m doing well in Bosnia and Herzegovina, but there’s always room for improvement,” Forto concluded.
Edin Forto graduated in journalism and mass communication from the School of Media and Journalism at the University of North Carolina in the late 1990s. He then obtained a master’s degree in international finance and business from Columbia University in New York in the early 2000s.
He started his career as a political analyst in New York but soon returned to Bosnia and Herzegovina, where he worked in the private sector for over a decade. He entered politics in 2009 as a member of Naša stranka [Engl. Our Party], which elected him as its president in September 2021.
In the 2014 and 2018 General elections, he was elected as a representative in the Sarajevo Canton Assembly. At the same time, he was delegated to the House of Peoples of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina Parliament as a representative of the “Others”.
Forto served as the Prime Minister of Sarajevo Canton from 2019 to 2023. In early 2023, he was appointed the Minister of Communications and Transport at the state level. In an interview with CIN, he emphasized that the private interests of public officials must be subordinated to the public interest. During his term as the Prime Minister of Sarajevo Canton, he advocated for the adoption of the Law on Reporting and Verification of Asset Data of Public Office Holders in Sarajevo Canton.
“I believe that everyone who enters politics and receives a salary from the budget must disclose everything,” Forto concluded.
