ZAGREB, February 28, 2020 – Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) leader Andrej Plenković and his campaign team on Thursday handed in to the party’s election commission lists with more than 45,000 signatures of HDZ members supporting his candidacy for HDZ president as well as lists with signatures supporting candidates for deputy president and vice-presidents.
Plenković arrived at the HDZ headquarters accompanied by some 200 party members, including many government ministers.
He collected the signatures of 45,792 party members, while Tomo Medved, who was nominated for HDZ deputy president, collected 38,909 signatures. The candidates for HDZ vice-presidents, Oleg Butković, Zdravka Bušić, Branko Bačić and Ivan Anušić, each collected more than 30,000 signatures.
Plenković said that his team’s platform was also the platform for the coming parliamentary elections.
He said the team’s campaign, which would start on March 1, would be constructive and positive, and that after the intraparty elections, set for March 15, the HDZ would be stronger, more united and ready for victory in the parliamentary elections.
Asked by reporters if his coming to the party offices in the company of some 200 people was a demonstration of power and a message to his rivals in intraparty elections, Plenković said that his team enjoyed great support in the party and on the ground and that many wanted to attend the submission of lists with signatures.
Answering a reporter’s question, he said that he would be able to continue cooperating with his rivals regardless of a possible exchange of strongly-worded statements.
“Yes, but we first have to make an effort so that the six of us win the elections,” he said.
He added that there would be room in the party for Davor Ivo Stier, who is in rival Miro Kovac’s campaign team, “also after he loses in these elections.”
Asked if he expected agreement to be reached with ethnic minority MPs regarding the adoption of amendments to the Census Act, Plenković said that a meeting of the parliamentary majority would be held on Friday morning and that he expected agreement to be reached on the matter.
He also said that he did not intend to “make any offers” regarding the bill, recalling the government and HDZ’s position that the law in question was a technical law that should be adopted so that everyone could prepare for the census.
Noting that the bill had been put to public consultation, Plenković said that the provisions which minority MPs were asking for did not exist in neighbouring countries where Croats are a minority and some of the minority MPs were part of a majority.
He said that there had been no discrimination in the selection of census takers and that some issues could be regulated by instructions to be issued during the census.
He expressed confidence that the law would be adopted by the parliament.
Plenković also said that regardless of possible attempts, nobody would topple the government before the end of the term of the current parliamentary majority and parliament.
“When that happens, we will be the ones to decide about it,” he said.
Asked how the government would regulate Sunday work, he said that they wanted to reduce the intensity of work, notably of people who work in shops on Sundays, thus protecting family values.
He stressed that the government was closest to the Austrian model which limits the number of working Sundays.
More HDZ news can be found in the Politics section.
