February 29, 2020 - Miroslav Škoro, a candidate in the recently held presidential elections in Croatia, announced today that he is to found his political party, called "Miroslav Škoro Homeland Movement".
After his quite successful bid at the presidential elections, where he managed to take the third-highest number of votes (and miss the runoff election by a very small margin of votes), Miroslav Škoro often hinted at his plans to start a new political party in time for the upcoming parliamentary elections. And that is exactly what he has announced to the public today, in Panorama Hotel in Zagreb, where he presented the new political party in Croatia: Miroslav Škoro Homeland Movement.
He's insistent that it's not just a party, rather a movement (which is what the name also implies), and that he's starting a party not because he wants to, but because he has to, as the situation in Croatia is so dire. He took the opportunity in his opening speech to tell anyone who wants to get into his party so they'd be able to sell their votes later to leave the room, as there will not be room for corruption in his party.
In the speech, he also repeated most of what he stood for during his presidential campaign: the strong "sovereignist" policies, including the insistence on 'maintaining the right to decide who gets to enter the Republic of Croatia'. To that he adds that we don't need further divides, we need unity, that this is not the country for which the fighters fought during the Homeland war, and that we are a country built on the blood, tears and terror of the Homeland War, in which life starts at conception, and each child should have a father and a mother. As one of his key political goals, he recognizes the attempt to decry all totalitarian regimes, including the communist regime.
Most people who are supporting Škoro as he founds his party are former associates of Branimir Glavaš, former army general during the Homeland war, former Member of the Parliament who's been indicted (and found guilty, with verdicts being overturned later) of war crimes in Osijek.
Although the party is dubbed as a movement, none of the parties that supported Škoro in the presidential bid hasn't officially joined the Homeland Movement. MOST, Hrvatski suverenisti, and Zlatko Hasanbegović's party are close to Škoro politically and will probably negotiate some kind of coalition for the parliamentary elections.