Ognjen Tadic of the Serb Democratic Party (SDS) was unanimously elected the upper house's speaker. The office of Deputy Speaker, designed for Bosnian Muslim (Bosniak) representatives, will be filled in by Sulejman Tihic of the Party of Democratic Action (SDA).
SDP MP Krunoslav Vrdoljak said that the support for Covic's election was a result of efforts to defuse political tensions in the country, caused by a lack of agreement on the ruling majority at the state level.
The support to Covic should be understood as an attempt to make certain concessions, Vrdoljak said.
Covic and Tihic said that this might herald a final agreement on making up the governing majority at the state level.
"This is, perhaps, a practical example that we can make a key agreement if we really want to," Covic said.
Covic's HDZ and the SDP are at loggerheads over the make-up of the ruling majority in the Croat-Bosniak entity, that is the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.