After two days of silence, Prime Minister Tihomir Orešković reacts to government turmoil.
On Friday afternoon, Prime Minister Tihomir Orešković ended his two days of silence and gave a statement to reporters about latest events.
“On Wednesday, he had a meeting of the cabinet which was very productive and we made some key decisions. Today, we have signed strategic contracts about oil exploration in Slavonia which will bring investments. The message is clear: this government is functioning, and it is in interest of Croatia for the government to keep working.
I am still waiting for Mr. Karamarko to call me. I am open to having a discussion with him. So far, we have not talked, actually we have not communicated for quite a long time. If we did, then perhaps the situation would be different.
As for the motion of no confidence against me, I simply cannot accept it, because by resigning now I would admit false charges that are included in the motion. I will give my answer to these false accusations in front of members of Parliament who gave me their confidence. I am not afraid to go to the place where I came on my very first day.
The accusations in the motion of no confidence are false and I need to defend myself. Then, the voting in Parliament will take place and everything will be solved there. As for the early elections, the Parliament is the place where it will be decided whether the elections will take place or not.
When it comes to the issues of national security, the President and I are in constant contact. While I came here to primarily deal with the economic issues, the Security Intelligence Agency is part of my responsibility.
The reason why I asked for deputy prime ministers Petrov and Karamarko to resign was the fact that we could not function like this. I wanted to change something to find a solution and therefore I asked Mr. Karamarko and Mr. Petrov to resign, so that the government could function again. Mr. Petrov was ready to resign, which would be the best solution, but Mr. Karamarko was not ready to do that.
As for the alleged offer by HDZ for me to stay in the new government as a minister, there was no such offer.
I still hope that reason will prevail. Next week, everything will be clearer, but I believe reason will win.
I respect HDZ as a party, they are my partners and they gave me their support. We have good results, GDP is growing, all indicators are positive, deficit, debt, number of employed workers, salaries, all indicators are positive, and therefore I still hope the reason will prevail”, concluded the Prime Minister.
