President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović has officially called the elections for 11 September.
Presidents of the parties gathered in the People’s Coalition signed on Satuday in Zabok a coalition agreement. The agreement was signed by SDP president Zoran Milanović, HNS president Ivan Vrdoljak, HSS president Krešimit Beljak and HSU president Silvano Hrelja, report Index.hr and Večernji List on July 16, 2016.
“We have not come to Zabok by chance. This is the part of Croatia where the first tangible results of our work, efforts and successes in the past four years have been seen”, said Zoran Milanović after the signing of the agreement. He said that the coalition would focus on jobs and education.
According to Krešimir Beljak, the coalition will not deal with the past but with the future, the issues of the future of Croatian children, Croatian villages and cities, the nation and all its citizens, regardless of religion, nationality and origin, and fight for Croatia of the 21st century which will have a stable government.
Ivan Vrdoljak said that the coalition would assume political responsibility and restore dignity, not only to political institutions, but also to Croatian citizens, will create future with modern education and developed economy, and will prove that Croatia can be better than it was in the past year.
Silvano Hrelja said that the signing of the coalition agreement would mark a historic shift in Croatia, saying that we need a “better, fairer and smarter Croatia”.
On Saturday, President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović called the early parliamentary elections for 11 September. As expected, the President called the elections just one day after the official dissolution of Parliament. However, her decision will come into force “on the day of its publication in the Official Gazette”, which means that the deadlines concerning the election formalities for political parties will start running on that date, which is still unknown.
When the decision is officially published, a period of two weeks will begin in which political parties will have to submit their candidate lists. There are rumours that the delay is an attempt by the President to help new HDZ president Andrej Plenković to have a little bit more time to prepare candidate lists for his party and that the decision will be published in the Official Gazette at the beginning of August.
However, the President's office denied such speculation and added that the decision would be published in several days (not weeks), with the intent to allow the public a few extra days of peace during the summer holiday season. Furthermore, if her decision were to immediately come into effect, the official campaign would last longer than ever before.
