The Federation of BiH finally set up this week a “solidarity fund,” which will be the entity government’s lead agency for distributing reconstruction assistance to citizens who lost property in May’s record floods.
Nermin Niksic, the Prime Minister of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, said the fund would sort out a number of matters related to gathering further donations and distributing what has been obtained so far.
“We have to resolve the illusion that loads of money is lying in the fund and waiting to be used,” he said.
“There are a range of activities we have to do before that. Most of the money coming from the donors’ conference [in July in Brussels] in fact is in credits, though some are also donations.”
Prime Minister Niksic also blamed some of the delay on local officials, saying that some towns had received funds already, but that “their mayors either don’t know what to do with it, or are waiting to get all the money [they need] before starting reconstruction.”
