ZAGREB, April 21, 2020 – Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said on Monday that the government was making well-thought-out decisions in the context of the coronavirus epidemic and would also define measures to relaunch some of the economic activities in line with epidemiological standards.
The measures to relaunch some economic activities will be defined at a government session on Thursday, Plenković said, declining to specify those measures.
“Once the entire set is finalised, we will present it,” he told reporters after a session of his HDZ party’s presidency.
He did not agree with assessments that Croatia was late in adopting measures to restart economic activities, describing them as an attempt to exert pressure on the government.
“All the countries that announced a certain easing of restrictions, notably big ones, had the highest number of fatalities on the day when they expressed their hope that restrictions would be eased. We are not in such a situation nor do we have a large number of infections or fatalities. Our decisions are rational, well-prepared, based on experts’ opinions and on a clear political estimate as was the set of measures designed to alleviate the impact of the crisis on the economic sector,” he said.
He added that measures designed to reactivate some parts of the economic sector would also be well-thought-out and rational.
The government must not allow a situation in which it would be pressured into easing restrictions and then experience an upsurge in the number of infections, he warned.
As for President Zoran Milanović’s comment that decisions in Croatia should start to be made at the political and no longer at the expert level, Plenković said that all decisions that had been made were also political decisions.
“One should distinguish between political decisions of the government and ministers and the so-called health-epidemiological framework, which is about adjusting certain measures in the interest of our citizens’ health safety. The national civil protection authority did not just come out of the blue, it was established based on a government decision,” he said.
He added that all members of the national authority were appointed to represent departments. “And those departments are government departments… decisions to be made by the government on Thursday will also be political decisions and then epidemiologists will fit them into a framework to prevent putting at risk all the achievements of the recent weeks,” he said.
Plenković also said that the HDZ would give up 20% of its funds, from the tranche for the second quarter, to be used for the fight against the coronavirus epidemic.
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