ZAGREB, October 29, 2018 – Croatian Social Liberal Party (HSLS) leader Darinko Kosor said in response to questions from the press on Monday that his party would leave the ruling coalition if Zagreb mayor Milan Bandić’s party joined the government.
Bandić’s parliamentary group has increased to 10 members in the last few days, and media predict that it will continue to grow, although Bandić’s slate has won only one seat in the present parliament.
The increase in the number of lawmakers in Bandić’s parliamentary group has prompted media speculation that the Zagreb mayor could call for entry into the government given that now it controls twice as many MPs as the Croatian Democratic Union’s (HDZ) strategic partner in the ruling coalition, the Croatian People’s Party (HNS), which has two ministers.
“Unlike the other coalition partners, the HSLS is the HDZ’s partner from before the elections when Plenković and I put together a coalition which no one believed would win the elections. We agreed then that we would build a decent Croatia. If now we were to allow the government to be changed based on political corruption, it would not be our agreement any more. I still believe that this will not happen, first of all that Andrej Plenković will not do that for his own sake. But if it does happen, we will no longer be part of the ruling coalition,” Kosor told the press in the parliament.
Interestingly, Kosor does not seem to mind that both the ruling coalition and the government have been depended on Bandić’s MPs ever since HDZ broke up its previous coalition with MOST in spring 2017.
Bandić has been expanding his parliamentary group ever since, mainly by drawing in MPs from opposition parties who have suddenly decided they will no longer be in opposition.
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