April 18, 2021 - Zagreb mayoral candidate, Vesna Škare Ožbolt, has said that that it will be challenging to have a majority in the City Assembly after the 16 May local elections, so at a moment when Zagreb is faced with a crisis, she sees a need for a big coalition of all political blocs in the assembly.
Škare Ožbolt said that carrying out projects such as Zagreb on the River Sava and the leveling of the railway tracks would take more than four years, but she would launch them during the first term.
There is still money even in these times of crisis, but the question is where that money goes, whether it ends up in private pockets or is used to improve citizens' lives. Someone has already calculated that 20% of the budget is spent on corruption, and 20% is HRK 3 billion. That is an enormous amount of money, she said in the interview which Hina published on Sunday.
My projects are ambitious, aimed at quickly raising Zagreb. Zagreb is in the biggest crisis ever, and it is devastated, damaged in the (22 march 2020) earthquake, and economically lags behind other European cities. That must change, said this 59-year-old lawyer.
My first goal is to carry out the city's reconstruction, raise living standards, start developing the city through infrastructure projects, and upgrade communal infrastructure in all parts of the city. Then, I want to bring the transport infrastructure back to normal, lower the railway below ground level. My goal is also to adopt a complete General Urban Plan because a complete GUP has not been adopted since 1971.
Today, the railway divides Zagreb. If it is placed underground, you get a green belt from Sesvete to the western part of the city. There is money from European funds for that, she claims
The second big project is putting the River Sava into the city's function. Zagreb is the only city with a river it does not use. First, mini-hydro power plants would be set up to control the river's flow. This project has indeed existed for years, but it is not at all clear to me why no funds have been requested for it, she added.
As soon as the assembly is formed, we will overhaul the City Administration and create a mega-institute for the city's reconstruction that will include all smaller offices, said Škare Ožbolt, former justice minister in the Ivo Sanader government.
Škare Ožbolt left the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) when the party lost the 2020 parliamentary elections. Together with the former foreign minister, Mate Granić, she founded the Democratic Centre (DC) party and was a minister in the Sanader government as a DC official from late December 2003 until February 2006.
In the mid-1990s, she engaged the negotiations with local Serb rebels on the peaceful reintegration of eastern Croatia into the country's constitutional and legal system.
For more about politics in Croatia, follow TCN's dedicated page.
