Much still remains to be done. Stuebner says preliminary plans call for a series of town meetings throughout the country, fund-raising and media campaigns to generate support for the commission, with the hope that a popular groundswell will persuade the necessary legislative bodies to adopt the concept. A board of governors representing all of Bosnia and the international community would be formed. Bosnia s Inter-Religious Council, Stuebner said, hopes the chairman of the South Africa Commission, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, will visit Bosnia and Herzegovina, perhaps next September, to assist in explaining the merits of the system. But a commission will only work if Bosnian politicians as well as a large segment of the public agree to it.
Parliamentary approval is essential to establishing it.
Most of the leadership was in power during the war and does not want to dredge up certain things, a savvy Bosnia specialist who lives in Sarajevo said. So there will be huge obstacles to even forming a truth and reconicilation commission here, and if it is not done properly, having a bad commission could be worse than not having one at all. One thing we learned in South Africa, Dr. Boraine said, was to be able to see in the dark, to see when it appeared to be hopeless. That was midnight. That was when we realized that to be hopeless is to be paralyzed.