2024 Mostar municipal elections

This is the second election after a twelve-year intermission and just the fifth in the country. Most of the seats in the council are held by national-oriented parties, Croatian Democratic Union of Bosnia and Herzegovina controlling 13 seats and Party of Democratic Action with 11 seats.^[1]

Mostar is one of the cities in Bosnia and Herzegovina known for its ethnic division. Since the end of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the city has been divided into a western part with a Croat majority and an eastern part with a Bosniak majority. According to the 2013 census, Croats make up 48.4% of the city, Bosniaks 44.1%, and Serbs 4.1%.

When electing councilors to the City Council of the City of Mostar, voters vote on two ballots. One is used to elect parties at the level of the entire city, and the other at the level of six city areas, in three of which Bosniaks make up the majority, and in three Croats. There are 35 councilors in the council, of which 13 are elected from the city constituency, and 22 are proportionally divided according to the number of voters in six city areas. Seats distributed by the Sainte-Laguë method for parties that have crossed the electoral threshold of 3%.

The mayor of Mostar is elected indirectly from the City Council. If in two rounds of voting none of the candidates receives two-thirds support from 35 councilors, a third round is organized in which a simple majority is sufficient.^[2] In case of a tie, the mayor will become a younger candidate.^[3]

On 25 July 2024, the Central Electoral Commission (CIK) made decisions on order of candidate lists.^[4] The table below is a list of the all parties and electoral coalitions which are contesting the election in Mostar.^[5]

The city council was constituted on 3 December 2024 with mayoral elections hold the same day. Mario Kordić was in the race with Đani Rahimić, who was nominated by the Coalition for Mostar, and Slaven Bevanda, who was nominated by HRS. After the counting, in the first round 17 councilors voted for Mario Kordić, 13 for Đani Rahimić, and three councilors for Slaven Bevanda. Two councilors submitted invalid ballots, one was incomplete and the other was filled in incorrectly. Kordić and Ramihić entered the second round of voting. Although both rounds of voting were said to last ten minutes, both rounds took significantly longer. In the second round, Rahimić received 13 votes, and Kordić 19. There were three invalid ballots. Since a two-thirds majority was not achieved, the third round of voting was started, in which a simple majority of the votes of the elected city councilors is required for the election of the mayor. In the third round of voting, Rahimić received 15 votes and Kordić 20, thus becoming the new, old mayor.^[6]