The process of nominating candidates for the new president of the Serbian Chamber of Commerce (SCC) is underway and the selected candidate may be appointed by end of June, people at SCC told Beta news agency Thursday.

As Beta learns, candidates for the new president of SCC are Milos Bugarin, current president of SCC, and Slobodan Milosavljevic, former minister of trade and services of Serbia.

Bugarin's mandate ends this year, on September 6, and, according to the statute of SCC, he can be nominated for another four-year mandate. Before he came to the Serbian Chamber of Commerce, Bugarin was at the head of the agricultural company PKB.

After the government reshuffle, Milosavljevic lost the position of a minister and he currently works as Bugarin's adviser. He was appointed as CEO of SCC in April 2004 and as president of SCC in December 2004. He stayed in that position until May 15, 2007, when he became the minister of agriculture.

Milosavljevic was appointed as the minister of trade, tourism and services for the first time in 2001 when Zoran Djindjic was the prime minister. He left that position when DOS lost the parliamentarian elections in December 2003.

As people at SCC told Beta, the president will be elected by the Assembly of the Serbian Chamber of Commerce, while candidates can be nominated by managing boards of regional and provincial chambers of commerce.

Nominations can also be submitted by the boards of associations and boards of SCC, executive boards of the Association of Entrepreneurs within SCC, the Cooperative Association of Serbia, as well as members of the SCC Managing Board.

The deadline for nominating a candidate for the new president of SCC is May 31, and the elected candidate must be appointed until September 6 when Bugarin's mandate expires.