Milorad Dodik, the Bosnian Serb nationalist leader, has declared victory for his party in general elections held on Sunday in Bosnia-Herzegovina, in a vote marked by a sharp fall in turnout, economic frustration and ethnic divisions that have persisted since the 1992-95 war. Dodik did not appear on the ballot, but his Alliance of Independent Social Democrats (SNSD) is on course to keep control of the Republika Srpska assembly, the Serb-dominated of the country's two entities. With roughly 90% of votes counted, his ally Željka Cvijanović held more than 55% in the race for the Serb seat on the three-member presidency, about 30 points ahead of her nearest rival.

In the other presidential contests, Darijana Filipović of the nationalist Croatian Democratic Union led for the Croat seat. The incumbent Bosniak member, Denis Bećirović of the Social Democratic Party, was narrowly ahead of Bakir Izetbegović. Electoral authorities put turnout at 42%, down by 8 to 10 points from 2022. About 3.4 million people were eligible to vote for more than 500 posts. For the first time, ballots were scanned and counted electronically and biometric identification was used, in a country where fraud allegations are common. One Bosnian Serb analyst said the changes meant the dead could no longer vote, though she described the campaign as dull and built on familiar ethnonational themes.

Dodik, 67, was removed as president of Republika Srpska in 2025 and barred from public office for six years after being convicted of defying the international envoy who oversees the 1995 Dayton peace agreement. He has nonetheless remained the dominant figure in the entity. Speaking in Banja Luka, its administrative capital, he credited Donald Trump's 2024 victory and the support of Russian president Vladimir Putin, saying that without the former his party would probably be "political corpses". At a rally days earlier he had said Bosnia "is dead". Analyst Dragan Bursać said the ban was clearly not working: "He is everywhere." Another analyst noted that Dodik had recently threatened not to recognise the results if he lost, objecting to the new voting technology.

The outcome matters because Bosnia's complicated system, created by the Dayton agreement to manage divisions among Muslim Bosniaks, Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croats, relies on cooperation that Dodik has repeatedly challenged through separatist rhetoric. Bosnia became an EU candidate in December 2022 and was cleared to open accession talks in 2024, but the process is stalled over demands for reforms on judicial independence, corruption and the rule of law. Analyst Adi Cerimagic said Dodik's stated aim remains weakening the state level and strengthening Republika Srpska, while his party shows no intention of cooperating with Brussels in good faith. Bećirović favours closer ties with the EU and NATO, while Croat parties are pressing for electoral reform.

Voters' daily concerns are largely economic. Bosnia is one of Europe's poorest countries; trade unions say average wages rose from 570 to 885 euros since 2022, but living costs climbed more than 50%. The war killed more than 100,000 people, and its wounds were recently reopened by public tributes to wartime commander Ratko Mladić, who died in August while serving a life sentence for genocide.