Comments of Croatians who have left Croatia and bleak forecasts about further mass emigration of people from Croatia should be a reason for alarm. Most people who have left Croatia do not want to return. Since independence, not much has been done to keep young people in the country. Asked about the reasons, most give a similar answer: “If you are young and live in Croatia, you have a big problem”, reports Slobodna Dalmacija on March 30, 2019.
Taking into account people who are likely to leave Croatia by 2026, the total number of emigrants could reach 800,000 people, with 300,000 already gone. In the next seven years, Croatia could lose virtually everybody who could emigrate, and then the emigration will stop.
These alarming figures have been published by Tado Jurić, who presented his book about the emigration of Croatians to Germany, which includes the results of the first scientific research on the causes and consequences of the recent emigration wave of Croats moving to Germany.
The survey was conducted in Germany among Croatian emigrants who left Croatia after it became EU member in 2013, on a sample of 1200 respondents. “The book represents the voice of the emigrants who have left Croatia in the last five years, and that is their message to the Croatian government. People living in Germany filled out a whole series of questionnaires, starting with how satisfied they are with life in Germany, why they would not return to Croatia, why they left,” said Jurić.
“No EU member state has ever witnessed an increase in emigration by 1000%, from 5,000 to 50,000 citizens annually, in just four years. Young people aged between 20 and 40 are leaving with their families because they have lost hope and security. Unfortunately, nothing suggests that there is a serious impulse in the society that things could change,” Jurić said and added that Prime Minister Andrej Plenković claims that people are returning to Croatia and that is true. About 15,000 people are returning every year, but these are old emigrants who are retiring, not the young people who have left, Jurić pointed out.
According to the perception of emigrants who have participated in the research, the main motives for emigration are not economic. The analysis of the positions of Croats in Germany has shown that Croatian emigrants believe that the values of work ethic and honesty have not been institutionalised in Croatia and they think that Croatian society has been morally broken.
The main factors leading to emigration are classified into several categories. “The main category is the weakness of the institutions and the immorality of the political elites, so we can say that Croats are emigrating due to injustice, not poverty. On the one hand, we do not reward the correct behaviour, and on the other hand, we do not punish incorrect behaviour. Judiciary is a major issue that our emigrants point out,” Jurić said.
Immoral political elites, legal insecurity, nepotism and corruption are certainly among the leading causes of emigration. If a job position is opened, they are mostly filled with people with the right connections or those who have the correct membership card. Such are the most often heard comments from the emigrants.
Most emigrants are people between the ages of 25 and 40, and they made up 58% of the respondents. Slightly less than 10 per cent of the respondents did not look for work before emigrating, about 39 per cent were unemployed and were actively looking for a job, while 55 per cent were employed.
About 25 per cent of respondents have an entirely negative attitude towards Croatia, and 70 per cent are satisfied with their jobs and lives in Germany. About 51% of them plan to stay in Germany, about 15% could return to Croatia, while the rest could move from Germany to another country. Although Ireland is often mentioned in the media, Germany is still the country where most emigrants move to.
Translated from Slobodna Dalmacija (reported by Jakov Žarko).
More news about mass emigration from Croatia can be found in the Politics section.
