4 April 2022 - Tomislav Žigmanov's being elected to the Serbian parliament is extremely important for Croat representation, Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said on Monday.
He wrote on Twitter that he congratulated Žigmanov this morning.
Croatian Foreign Minister Gordan Grlić Radman also congratulated Žigmanov on Twitter, but also warned that despite the seat won, Sunday's election was yet another one in which Serbia failed to comply with the 2005 bilateral agreement on the protection of national minorities.
He said the Croatian government would continue to insist on reciprocity at all government levels.
According to the first unofficial results of the election, Democratic Alliance of Croats in Vojvodina (DSHV) president Žigmanov, the first on the coalition slate "Together for Vojvodina - Vojvodians", will be a member of the Serbian parliament.
In his first reaction, he said the coalition's pre-election activities had yielded the desired result and that the DSHV was politically relevant once again. He added that he was extremely satisfied with the results given that the election process had many deficiencies.
The coalition's slate had 26 candidates for the Serbian parliament who were supported by the League of Vojvodina Social Democrats and a number of prominent individuals and Croat associations in Vojvodina.
In order to secure a seat, they had to pass the so-called natural threshold or at least 10,000 votes. Ahead of the polls, the slate was supported by the Croatian government via the Foreign Ministry, several Croatian county heads and Croatian MPs.
Žigmanov thanked them for that and said the Croatian government would continue to have a reliable partner in him and the DSHV.
