MOST leader Petrov writes to him members about the negotiations with SDP and HDZ, as HDZ growing confident of forming the government.
MOST leader Božo Petrov sent yesterday a letter to his party colleagues which was later published on Facebook by Josip Katalinić, one of the newly-elected members of parliament. In his letter, Petrov has accused SDP president Zoran Milanović of trying to break up MOST, reports Index.hr, Jutarnji List and Vecernji List on December 1, 2015.
“While a part of the media carried out campaign against MOST, other parties started calling our members, seeking meetings, promising everything, mostly SDP, but HDZ as well. Although it was Drago Prgomet’s fault for choosing the path he had chosen immediately after the elections, the political blame for the attempt to break up MOST equally belongs to Zoran Milanović as well. As prime minister, he had a secret meeting with a prominent member of MOST. We had not broken off talks with SDP at the time, although we had a perfect excuse to do that”, Petrov wrote. “We have to remain faithful to that which we have advocated from the beginning: to reforms, and not to SDP or HDZ. We need a joint reform government based on consensus. I hope that reason and responsibility to the Croatian citizens will eventually prevail”, Petrov concluded.
The letter came after the last few days of internal divisions within MOST, during which three members of parliament have unofficially left the party. Given that Drago Prgomet was earlier expelled from the party, the number of MOST’s members of parliament has fallen from 19 to 15. The remaining 15 MPs claim that they are united and have not given up on their ideas about a reform government.
They also say that they did not have time to review the replies that the two coalitions have sent to their questions. “We are going to meet on Tuesday or Wednesday and come to some conclusions. After that, we will probably meet again separately with SDP and HDZ, and then try to initiate a joint meeting”, Nikola Grmoja, a founder and spokesman of MOST, said.
The first sitting on the newly-elected parliament will be held on Thursday, and it is rumoured that MOST will propose its member Robert Podolnjak as the new speaker of the Croatian Parliament.
Jutarnji List reported that HDZ president Tomislav Karamarko has received support of Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandić, whose party has two seats in the parliament. HDZ’s Patriotic Coalition reportedly also has the formal support of the two representatives of national minorities – Mirko Rašković, Serbian representative who yesterday announced he was leaving SDSS party, and Albanian representative Ermina Lekaj Prljaskaj.
Darinko Kosor, president of HSLS, HDZ’s junior coalition partner, indirectly confirmed yesterday they were counting on Bandić’s support. “We expect that we will soon establish cooperation with 15 members of parliament from MOST. That would be enough to form a majority”, Kosor said. This would suggest that Patriotic Coalition has managed to get the support of at least two additional members of parliament – either the two minority representatives, or two of the Bandić’s members, and maybe all of them. The coalition has 59 seats of its own, and with 15 seats belonging to MOST, they need two more seats to have a razor-thin majority of 76 seats. However, they are convinced that, if they agree cooperation with MOST, some of the minority representatives which have given their support to Milanović will switch sides and support HDZ instead.
