Vlaho Orepić has seen his fair share of political alterations in Croatia, from becoming minister of the interior during Tihomir Orešković’s government, to being shockingly dismissed by Andrej Plenković, to stepping down as an MP for MOST, one of the partners of the former ruling coalition, eventually breaking away entirely and forming a new party of his own – Nova Politika.
Known for not only his position as the minister of the interior, but for his achievements in the sporting world and his political activities in his beloved town of Ploče, Konavle-born Orepić sat down with us to discuss the past, the present, and the future, including his new party.
Why did you decide to set up a brand new political party? What values does it, and you, represent?
Through the experiences I gained through my civic activism, and then through my direct participation in the work of the Government and the Parliament of Croatia I realised that politics in Croatia is not what should be expected of it. It doesn’t do the work of the people. On the contrary, all the policies of the past have disrupted the [lives of the] Croatian people, and has impoverished the Croatian economy.
So, we need something new, that is Nova Politika, which will be what people expect it to be, and that means working for the people. This need, this message, and these values are contained in the idea and the very name Nova Politika.
How will your party differ from the countless others who are already operating in Croatia?
We simply need order in the country, as well as in political and social relations because we as a country aren’t in a crisis, but we are in disorder. The basic two goals of Nova Politika are the protection of democratic principles and procedures in political relations and the institutional arrangement, as well as the optimisation of the state. Nova Politika as a party is, unlike others, a project. A project of getting together with the aim of institutional convergence from the current disorder putting the country in order.
There are many challenges which require ambitious structural reforms, so new, life-motivated policies are needed.
First and foremost, what we’re going to invest a huge amount of energy into is the struggle for the legitimacy of elections. The outcomes of the entire series of electoral processes in Croatia are crucially influenced by the voices of those who have filed a false residence in the Republic of Croatia, and as such gain a whole range of substantive rights, as well as voting rights. In its electoral register, Croatia has at least 150,000 such fictional voters. Parliament has a minimum of 4-6 parliamentarians who base their mandate on those fictional voters. That’s been going on for far too long and it needs to stop.
Why did not you take advantage of this opportunity and as the minister of the interior, solve this problem?
I didn’t manage to. They dismissed me. I believe that you’re familiar with the fact that I uncompromisingly tried to solve this problem. In just two and a half months, the police, to whom the law prescribed that obligation, prompted the deletion of 45,000 fictional residences. Very rapidly this figure has grown to 75,000. This issue, because of political incitement and abuse, is an exceptional problem in our society.
What is especially disturbing is that this is intractable abuse and a kind of blackmail of people in need. People who, because of realistic, existential problems, engage in illegal behavior such as the fictitious reporting of residence in the Republic of Croatia. The Republic of Croatia should systematically and legally care about its emigrants and not just keep tolerating this crime.
You’ve endured huge political resistance to this engagement of yours and even personal discreditation. Judging from your findings, which parties have encouraged fictitious voters to participate in the elections in the Republic of Croatia?
Fictitious voters’ transport from Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina was organised by the HDZ, SDSS and even MOST, which was concealing it from me as its minister. Even the activists engaged in the recent referendum initiatives have also collected signatures in the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina. During the pre-election campaign for local elections in Vrgorac, HDZ had a poster with a cross marked over my face which they stuck in neighbouring places and cities in western Herzegovina. With which they called “their” fictional voters to come to the elections.
But that doesn’t matter anymore. It’s important to realise the magnitude of this problem and to get credible electoral registers as soon as possible in order to guarantee the legality of elections in the Republic of Croatia. We need to get that in order. To move forward, we need to be able to count the results of the elections to match the real will of the citizens. That’s Nova Politika.
Will someone who is already active in political or public life enter your party? Maybe one of the members of MOST?
I hope we’ll all be able get together around the goal as Nova Politika is focused on its political goal, and all those who see Croatia as a decent and well-regulated state are welcome. Let’s say that proper order in the area of [registering] residence should be the target of everyone who wishes our homeland well. This is what I expect especially from those who ran their election campaigns based on fictional voters and who claim they’re sovereign.
Will you participate in the forthcoming European Parliament elections, and will you have your candidate for the president of the Republic of Croatia?
The focus is on parliamentary elections. But Nova Politika partaking either alone or in cooperation with someone else in all the upcoming elections hasn’t been ruled out.
What’s your opinion on the work of current President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović. Will you back her for a second term?
She failed to portray herself as the president of all citizens. We definitely need a new president.
At the moment, the most current issue is the collapse of an Israeli jet plane purchase. Do you think Croatia needs war planes? If so, how much money would you be willing to invest in their purchase?
We don’t need to call the need for war planes into question. But what we need to take into account is our financial situation. At this point, we have no money for that. We have a whole series of challenges that are related to our bare existence. We must take into account the life priorities that hav arisen from the situation in which we’re in and live within our means. Aircraft, at this time, aren’t something we can afford and aren’t a priority.
MOST has been looking like a conservative party recently, more and more. Do you share such a vision? If not, why were you in that party at all?
I don’t share the current worldview of MOST, which is significantly different from the one they were trying to show, and which dominated while I was in MOST. The leaders of MOST have repositioned MOST within the frameworks of their own personal worldviews. It isn’t mature, and it is a type of conflict politics, this is a political environment which I can’t identify with.
Why did you leave MOST?
MOST as a party abandoned the very idea of MOST, so I left MOST.
In two HDZ-MOST coalition governments, you were the interior minister. Would you enter into a coalition with HDZ again? Will you remain in the Parliament as an opposition representative until the end of your mandate or does a possibility for you to support the current government exist?
I’m going to remain an opposition MP.
Which parties would you potentially enter into a coalition with?
With this very question you’ve addressed a big problem in the functioning of politics in the Republic of Croatia. Nobody asks you what your suggestions are. What are your political goals, etc. People are already accepting or rejecting you on the basis of your ideological orientation. This approach to politics is wrong and that’s why we need Nova Politika. A policy that highlights clear goals and their implementation brings together the necessary majority. We need to evolve current politics into realistic politics. Politics that can and should be measurable. Politics which will be conditioned by the mutual interaction of the principles of trust and responsibility.
Davor Božinović succeeded you as the minister of the interior. How do you evaluate his work?
He’s completely unambiguous in his approach in these circumstances we’re in and his root changes make him look superficial. Manipulation with fictitious residences and some staffing solutions paralysed the operational work of the police and indicated a lack of workability. He acts unambiguously because he has no ambition and therefore no actual results.
What do you think about the Croatian police’s treatment in relation to migrants on the border with Bosnia and Herzegovina? Does the behavior of the police differ now than from when you were minister?
The migrant policy of Croatia, of which a lot is dealt with by the police I consider to be good. The work on the frontier is on the line of the one that was designed and established during my mandate. There is no leg room when it comes to illegal border crossings but there’s also a very human approach when it comes to caring for people in need. Some isolated failures in treatment can’t diminish the significance of the police work done.
When talking about migration policy, every day Croatia that it is a responsible member of the EU, because don’t forget that the Croatian police, in protecting the borders of the Republic of Croatia, are also working to protect the EU’s external borders.
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