The right-wing HSP AS is reportedly ready to abandon HDZ, and vice versa.
HDZ leaders held on Saturday a series of meetings with representatives of their current coalition partners, but the decision about which parties will be invited to join HDZ at the forthcoming parliamentary elections will be adopted by party bodies during the next week, reports Večernji List on July 24, 2016.
It is increasingly apparent that the new coalition will be different and that it will no longer be called the Patriotic Coalition. The reason is that the new party leadership does not want to keep anything which might remind voters of the “old” HDZ. Therefore it is even possible that HDZ will not form any real coalition, but that the party will just cooperate with certain partners in only some parliamentary constituencies.
HSP-AS secretary general Pero Ćorić says that they would remain part of the Patriotic Coalition, with HDZ or without it, since he claims that he is the author of the coalition name. If HDZ does not respond positively to their expectations in the next two days, he says, HSP AS will terminate their cooperation with HDZ in the City of Zagreb, in 12 county assemblies, and in 150 towns and municipalities where the party cooperates with HDZ in power.
“The difference between Andrej Plenković, Davor Stier and me is that they came to our meeting from the red carpets of Brussels and with almost 30,000 euros of income, while Pero Ćorić came from a city that is dying. That is Ilok. They really do need to convince me in the next day or two that they intend to stop the demographic decline of Croatia, that we have the power to recover Croatian economy, and that we will gather all patriotic forces in a coalition”, he said.
“We will wait for HDZ’s decision and then see what is best for Croatian citizens. If HDZ decides to resume their infighting, we will not participate in that. The offer which I heard they had given to HSLS – two safe seats in Parliament – for us that would be absolutely unacceptable”, added Ćorić.
