The Croatian party Homeland Movement has proposed a resolution on the Croats of Bosnia and Herzegovina that instantly rattled the ruling coalition - among other things, it demands a separate electoral unit for Croat voters and a possible review of the Croatian citizenships handed to residents of Bosnia.

According to the proposal, the Croatian Sabor should seek government backing for "full political equality of Croats in Bosnia" through a reform that would let each constituent people elect its own representatives, with a separate electoral unit as the first step. The most contentious part is precisely the clause on re-examining citizenships - for people who live in Bosnia but hold a Croatian passport. When a state starts talking about revoking citizenship, that's a subject that never ends quietly in the Balkans.

The reactions didn't take long. Prime Minister Andrej Plenković dismissed the initiative as a marketing move to raise the party's profile. The Homeland Movement shot back that "this is not a PR stunt" and asked people to read the document first. Bosniak representative Armin Hodžić called the initiative "unrealistic and badly timed", given that elections are four months away.

For the region, this is a familiar tune. The question of how a people fares in a neighbouring state always wears two faces - genuine concern for a minority, and a tool for domestic political gain. It's hard to tell where one ends and the other begins. And Bosnia, a country that barely holds together on a delicate internal balance as it is, is the last place where someone from the outside should be tossing in new proposals to redraw the electoral rules. Is this concern for the Croats, or fuel for a campaign that's just getting started?