23 more days to go
Even though election campaign hasn't officially started, all political parties are very active and have spread out not only across Croatia but across Europe to better their chances.
While the prime minister Milanović is in Brussels today attending the EU summit and spending most of his time answering questions regarding the migrant crisis and taking a break from verbally attacking the President, head of the largest opposition party Tomislav Karamarko is off to Germany where he will meet with the directors of the IFO institute, same ones that have developed HDZ's economic programme for the upcoming elections. As HINA reports, Mr Karamarko will convey the great reactions this programme has caused in Croatia, even though from we were able to see and hear, it caused more criticism than actual positive reactions. Mr Karamarko will also meet with the leaders of Croatian association which are active in Bavaria.
Former President Ivo Josipović is also busy. We don't know whether he is curing stress caused by the election campaign or is simply trying to give a helping hand, but his morning was spent demolishing walls in the new party offices which were given to his party by Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandić in the very centre of the city for a mere price of 2000 kn per month. Josipović will be sharing the building with his coalition partner Radimir Čačić and his Reformists.
Politics often turns enemies often become allies and in these elections this is becoming a rule not an exception. First we had the unlikely alliance of Čačić, Josipović and Kosor and newest unlikely pairing is Stipe Petrina's decision to join the association of independent lists MOST. We say unlikely, because until few months ago, Stipe Petrina was very active in attacking Božo Petrov, leader of Most, accusing him of being HDZ's Trojan Horse. Seems he's changed his mind, maybe MOST's good results in the recent polls in Dalmatia had something to do with his sudden change of heart.
Another party which is doing quite well in the polls in Dalmatia is PAMETNO, lead by Matrijana Puljak and they were busy yesterday presenting their election programme. They are proposing 18 measures that should result in a "Smart Croatia 2031". According to Puljak, they have worked with 40 experts from different fields to create the programme, they were developing it this whole summer and they say all of their long term solutions are based on analyses and evidence. Along with many other measures, they are proposing concrete solutions such as decentralisation, creation of 5 regions instead of the large county system we have at the moment, depolitisation of local administration, limiting politicians in local governments to only two terms, investments in the judiciary system, implementation of corruption indexes and an opening of a Dalmatian office in Brussels.
