Ahead of party consultations with the President on Wednesday, HDZ and MOST continue their discussions.
“We have made progress on seven demands which MOST announced before the election, and I think that we are close to an agreement on all issues, with a timetable for their implementation”, said HDZ president Andrej Plenković after five and half hours of negotiations with MOST on Monday evening, reports Večernji List on September 27, 2016.
MOST president Božo Petrov said there was reason for optimism since they had reached an agreement on almost all seven points. “There are details that will be worked out in the next few days. What is important now is that we have started the discussion on the main government programme points and guidelines for the future government. On the other hand, concerning the issue of the structure of government, we have not until now opened that issue and today we heard from Plenković about their position. We will have further consultations within MOST”, said Petrov, adding that he hoped the negotiations would soon be brought to an end. “There are reasons to expect that everything will end soon”, said Petrov.
Asked whether they started talks about the division of portfolios, Plenković said that HDZ had presented a vision of the future organization of the government. “There would be, according to our view, certain modifications to the existing structure. But it is not too different than now. We would like for structure of the government to reflect the priorities of our programme”, said Plenković. He added they did not talk about which party would control which portfolio, including the Ministry of Economy which reportedly both parties want.
“When we agree on the total number of members of the government, then we will talk about the number of ministers from each party. The most important thing right now is that we are almost certainly in a position to have a sufficient number of MPs that would enable parliamentary majority”, added Plenković, who pointed out that it was not necessary for him to bring MPs’ signatures of support to President on Wednesday, when the official party consultations will begin.
“We see this as the first initial round of consultations. As soon as our agreement is sufficiently stable, then we will be able to have the necessary number of signatures for the President to appoint a Prime Minister-Designate. We will respect the constitutional deadlines. We will meet every day”, said Plenković.
The official consultations between President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović and party leaders will start on Wednesday. She will appoint the Prime Minister-Designate after she is presented with at least 76 signatures of support from MPs in the new Parliament.
