Prime Minister Plenković responds to harsh accusations made by Agrokor’s owner.
“During the last five and a half months, together with all the other members of the government, I have been accused of protecting this man, trying to shift all of his debts onto taxpayers, but now it turns out that these accusations were not true,” said Prime Minister Andrej Plenković on Saturday, commenting on allegations made by former head of Agrokor and its majority owner Ivica Todorić, reports Jutarnji List on September 23, 2017.
“Our first and foremost interest was to protect the Croatian economy and the financial system, and we have succeeded. Not only did we protect jobs, but we also supplied Croatia during the tourist season. Imagine what would have happened without this move,” said Plenković in Zagreb.
He also commented on Todorić’s claim that his request for the activation of “Lex Agrokor” was signed under pressure. “You know that the legal provisions are such that they can only be activated if the company in question wants them to be activated. There was no government pressure there. Our position was that the restructuring of Agrokor would have a transformative effect on the Croatian economy. I think that today it is quite clear that this law was adopted in accordance with the constitution. Our interest was the stability of Croatia,” Plenković said and added, “We did not come to Agrokor, but Agrokor came to us.” “I know what the government is doing; you have to ask Mr Todorić about everything else.
The Prime Minister also commented on the decision by the Standard & Poor’s rating agency to keep the long-term credit rating of Croatia and upgrade the outlook from stable to positive, saying that it was an “an excellent step” towards returning the credit rating to the investment level.
“This is the second time in this government’s term that S&P has raised out credit rating outlook. About nine months ago, the move was from negative to stable, and now the outlook has been moved from stable to positive. This is an excellent step in the direction we want, which is to return our credit rating to the investment level,” said Plenković.
“The reasons are obvious, and we regularly talk about them: economic growth and the fiscal consolidation, that is, the reduction of the deficit. The best results which we had in the first six months of the year have confirmed this, and we will persevere in the future,” added Plenković.
He pointed out that Croatia is expected to continue with structural reforms and to perform the restructuring of its largest privately-owned company which was in difficulties.
Translated from Jutarnji List.
