Rapajic: There is no Referendum Law, but the petition was done according to the Administrative Instruction

The statement coming from the Municipality of North Mitrovica is somewhat accurate because there is no law in Kosovo regulating the organization of referendums, Aleksandar Rapajic, the Program Director of the ACDC organization in North Mitrovica, said speaking to Kosovo Online, however, he emphasized that there was an Administrative Instruction regarding the procedure for the dismissal of the mayor, which included a referendum as a part of the process.

The case where something is not regulated by law but is regulated by Administrative Instruction, according to Rapajic, leads to a legal vacuum, and that's why there are different interpretations.

"We see that the Municipality of North Mitrovica interprets that there is no legal provision. Accordingly, we see that the Central Election Commission has not responded for over a month regarding the submitted signatures for the petition to dismiss the mayor based on the Administrative Instruction that was issued. The Central Election Commission usually reviews signatures much faster when it comes to electoral processes, so it is not quite clear why there is such a delay. We have certain information from Pristina that is also contradictory; we have information from media circles that the petition has been accepted, but until we receive official information from the institutions, we cannot comment on it. We also have certain analysts who state that there is no referendum law and that it is impossible to organize one. I think this shows how the legal framework is not regulated, how there is room for things not to be done that should be done, and that the whole process of Administrative Instruction was not made to solve the problem but only to prolong it for as long as possible," Rapajic said.

He recalls that although the procedure was not done according to the law, it was done according to the Administrative Instruction.

"According to the Administrative Instruction, citizens have collected signatures, and now a referendum should be organized. Now we come to the main problem. The first problem is to verify these signatures, but even when these signatures are verified, who decides on the referendum, who will organize it, and who will monitor its process? Many of these things are not regulated, and that's what brings us to this legal vacuum where every institution shies away from responsibility, and in the end, the citizens on the ground suffer because we still have mayors who do not reflect the wishes of the population," Rapajic said.