ZAGREB, December 28, 2019 – The presidential candidate of the Social Democratic Party and a group of other centre-left parties, Zoran Milanović, held an election rally in the eastern city of Osijek on Friday, saying he hoped he would attract more voters than her rival, the incumbent president Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović, in the January 5 runoff.
“It will be very tight and uncertain until the very end. I will need every vote and every piece of trust people can give me, which I believe will make my victory realistic and attainable,” Milanović told reporters in the city’s main square.
Asked how he was going to win additional votes in Slavonia, especially from voters of Miroslav Škoro, who was a relative winner of the first round of the presidential election in four of five Slavonia counties, Milanović said he had been doing it for months, but that no radical changes could be achieved in the last five days of campaigning.
“I will continue to be present, drawing attention to what stands in Croatia’s way and prevents it from being a good and successful country,” he added.
Asked to comment on a statement made by Grabar-Kitarović in Karlovac today, in which she called on voters to vote for a true Croatia in the runoff, Milanović said: “For them a true Croatia is one led by the HDZ, in which she developed (politically) and obtained interest-free loans while others had to sell everything they had for a pittance.”
“For me, a true Croatia is something else, an open, curious and modern country, aware of its history, but not naive, not falling for every new trick and every new idea whatever it may be. A mature, sober and confident path leading Croatia into the immediate future,” he added.
Commenting on Prime Minister Andrej Plenković’s accusations that during his premiership he had increased the country’s debt, Milanovic said that his government “saved Croatia from debt collapse, although it took office in the worst financial crisis, with huge interest on our debt”, with a public debt of more than 65 percent, which was left by the HDZ government.
“That’s why I would like Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović to appear in the first one-on-one debate on Monday,” Milanović said, adding that that was also the right way to discuss other things apart from presidential powers, “but which show knowledge, a breadth of education and character, everything I believe I am better at than Grabar-Kitarović.”
Asked what his message would be to the people of Slavonia, Milanović said: “Things will be better, but not overnight.”
More news about presidential elections can be found in the Politics section.
