July 26, 2020 – A lot is already publicly known about the new Croatian government, although its ministers are yet to be officially announced. Who will be the new ministers?
From what we’ve been able to read in the media so far, the new government will have three first-time ministers, people less known to the Croatian public as they haven’t been in the political spotlight in the previous administrations. Jutarnji list writes about those three new ministers in Andrej Plenković’s government: Nikolina Brnjac, Boris Milošević, Nataša Tramišak. Let’s find out more about them, as the final preparations for Andrej Plenković’s meeting with President Zoran Milanović take place. In that meeting, the President will give Plenković the mandate to form the new government.
There was a lot of talk about Nikolina Brnjac as a minister in the Croatian government whenever there were any changes at any number of ministries since Plenković has been in charge. It’s often said that she’s one of “his people,” and the fact that she joined the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) when he became President in 2016 confirms the bond between them. She’s been the state secretary in two different ministries in the previous term: Ministry of the sea, traffic and infrastructure, where she left because of numerous disagreements with minister Butković, and after that, she went to the Foreign Ministry, where she was given an essential diplomatic role during the Croatian presidency, although she had no diplomatic experience. She was born in 1979, has a Ph.D. in traffic sciences. She is expected to head the newly-formed Ministry of tourism, youth, and sports. She held the eighth position on the HDZ slate for the elections, in IV election district, and got 552 preferential votes there, not winning a Parliament seat.
We’ve gotten used to the minority representatives in Croatia supporting whoever is forming the government, and once in a while, they even get a seat at the big table. This Andrej Plenković cabinet will be such a cabinet, with the position of Deputy Prime Minister for social activity and human rights created just to seat a minority representative. Boris Milošević will get that position, an experienced politician, born in 1974 in Šibenik, a representative for the Serbian minority. He’s a lawyer who’s already served in two administrations, both time as deputy Minister of Public Administration (interesting tidbit: once in an SDP government, and once in HDZ-Most government). He’s also the President of the Serbian National Council, where he took over after 22 years of Milorad Pupovac’s presidency. He got 7.715 votes at the election.
The least known to the general public among the three is Nataša Tramišak, a 38-year-old lawyer from Osijek, who’s spent most of her career working in regional development and EU funds, so it’s highly appropriate that she’s about to become a minister dealing with these topics. She hasn’t always been an HDZ member; before she joined, she ran for Antunović municipality position as a member of heavily right-wing HSP in 2009, along with Ivan Anušić, who has since become an HDZ vice-president. She’s worked in Osijek-Baranja County as a person in charge of investments and EU funds, where she’s proven herself to be a very successful workaholic, always on top of any project she’s in charge of.
If it turns out someone else is named to the Government position for the first time, we will update this article with information about the other new minister (there is still uncertainty on who will be the next Education and Science Minister).
