Bosnia Herzegovina to hold general elections

BELGRADE, Serbia

Bosnia and Herzegovina is preparing to hold elections on Sunday to choose lawmakers at the canton, entity, and national levels, as well as the three members of its Presidential Council.

Over 5,900 ballot boxes across the country will be open at 7.00 a.m. local time (0500GMT) with polling stations to receive voters for 12 hours, according to the Central Election Commission, with 60,000 observers to be on duty on the election day.

Some 3.3 million people are expected to vote for members of parliament in the country's two entities -- the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Republika Srpska -- as well as 10 cantons within the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Voters will also choose representatives for the national parliament Presidential Council and .

Bosnia Herzegovina's political structure is often dubbed as one of the most complicated in the world.

A total of nine candidates will compete in the election for the Bosniak, Serb, and Croat members of the Presidential Council.

This is the least number of candidates since 2002 when the four-year mandate was introduced.

That year, a total of 35 candidates competed for membership, with the number rapidly falling with each election since then.