As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, the people who once decided on the fate of the City of Zagreb for years, apparently untouchable, are now mostly retired from politics, some are engaged in kinesiology, some in security, and some in consulting, RTL reported.
Mirka Jozic is no longer in a leading position within the city administration, she’s now a business advisor. If you need help with finances, the environment, and utilities, this former close associate of Milan Bandic can give you advice. She left and founded her company a month ago and paid herself her very first salary.
“Well, it’s not a bad feeling to pay yourself your own salary, I mean, I used to work in the private sector, then in the public sector and now again in the private sector as an independent person. It’s all fun in its own way,” said Mirka Jozic.
She once had three thousand colleagues, and now she has none.
“My old colleagues and friends are still my friends, I don’t miss my old job and I think it’s time for a change and it will come in handy,” added Jozic.
He once commanded the situation during earthquakes, floods, fires, and he was known for his colourful use of language. He was the head of the Emergency Management Office for 13 years, an office he himself set up, but Pavle Kalinic now has a new job. He works in a security company where he is the director of corporate security and development.
In perhaps the saddest alteration, Zagreb’s much loved ”first dog” also unfortunately died after having had a tumour.
With the arrival of the new Zagreb government, eleven people left the chairs they had grown so comfortable sitting in, some too comfortable. Nine of them resigned at the request of the new mayor, Tomislav Tomasevic, and some of them, including Milana Vuković Runjic and Sanja Jerkovic, are now assistant heads.
Andrea Sulentic, the former head of the Mayor’s Professional Service, is suspected of rigging the competition for the director of the Srebrnjak Hospital. When she isn’t in the company of prison officers, she works in the regional office of the local self-government.
Miro Laco, who is accused of wrongdoing alongside Milan Bandic in the now somewhat infamous Agram affair, and Ivica Lovric, the former head of education, are now special advisers to the new mayor.
Apart from the head, many other people who once gathered around the late Milan Bandic will not welcome the autumn at their old jobs. The former head of Zagreb Holding, Ana Stojic Deban, got tired because the pace of the late mayor was difficult to follow.
“His day lasted over 20 hours, he had over 20 commitments a day.”
In a telephone conversation, she said that she is taking a break entirely until end of October, and then she’ll go into the private sector and withdraw entirely from public life. Slavko Kojic – Milan Bandic’s former head of finance and a friend with whom he worked for 35 years, doesn’t have those same plans.
“It’s dynamic for me because I’m versatile, I played sports and music. I’m active in Bandic’s party, I’m a business director and I’m there almost every day and I know everything that is happening,” said Kojic.
After the election, Jelena Pavicic Vukicevic also withdrew from the political scene and announced that she would continue her career as an assistant professor at the Faculty of Kinesiology in Zagreb.
As Milan Bandic’s time at the helm of Zagreb drew to a sudden close with the ending of his life, he took the many controversies and undoubtedly many secrets with him. As ”his people” gradually disperse, a new era for the Croatian capital is upon us – for better or for worse.
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