ZAGREB, 6 April, 2021 - The president of the Croatian Association of Social Workers, Štefica Karačić, asked on Monday where the responsibility of Social Policy Minister Josip Aladrović was in the case of the deceased two-and-a-half-year-old girl from Nova Gradiška.

The (local welfare centre's) director was dismissed and then, in a week, it was forgotten that the centre needs other forms of help and support to work in such a complex and difficult area of activity as child protection, Karačić told the Nova TV commercial broadcaster, and she asked why the minister wouldn't also be removed, if the responsibility was hierarchical.

She told Nova TV that the minister had made the same move as the previous one, so "by dismissing the director, he thinks that he has solved all his problems in the social welfare system".

Asked what has changed in the social welfare system after several difficult cases -- of a father who threw four children from the balcony of his house on Pag island and of a beneficiary who killed two of her colleagues in Đakovo, Karačić said that nothing had changed.

"Nothing has changed, the voice of various activists who have an easier and simpler access to policy makers than experts can be heard. We are always under suspicion, we are always the ones responsible. If the director is responsible hierarchically, then I wonder -- where is the minister's responsibility," Karačić asked.

She suggested that before meeting Jelena Veljača and her colleagues from the #spasi me (Save Me) initiative tomorrow, Minister Aladrović should have a look at what she had posted on her profile regarding the social welfare system and that he keep in mind that he is also a part of that system.

Asked whether an inspection has found any irregularities in the work of the centre in Nova Gradiška, she said that she and a colleague had been in the Centre for Social Welfare in Nova Gradiška on Friday and that they had not completed the inspection yet.

"Our preliminary inspection... does not indicate there were gross omissions in the work of the centre. However, I cannot say there weren't any until the procedure is completed," she noted.

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