The Prime Minister of Croatia and the President of the HDZ, Andrej Plenkovic, on Monday criticized the President of the Republic of Croatia for harmful behavior, violation of all ethical and legal principles, and dictatorial traits, commenting on Zoran Milanovic’s statements, the latest of which were related to Minister Oleg Butkovic.
After an event at the Keglic Sports Center, the president of HDZ responded to questions from journalists, including exchanges of messages and statements between Milanovic and Butkovic, advising Milanovic to “deal with his friend (Marina) Lovric Merzel and respond to Butkovic’s questions”.
“He is the leader of not only violating the Constitution but also of general and fundamental principles of the constitutional order. This political sabotage and diversion of parliamentary elections that he made – not only causing damage to the Croatian economy because it was a non-working day, Wednesday – HEP (Croatian Electric Power Company) has calculated that it is more than 300 million euros. He should think about what happens to children who did not go to school that day, and what happens to all the patients who had appointments for examinations. This is harmful behavior in financial and everyday operational life,” said Plenkovic, who once again did not mention Milanovic by name.
Referring to the opinion of the Constitutional Court and other constitutional-law experts that Milanovic violates the Constitution, Plenkovic added that he thinks there is no one in Croatia who is not aware of who “this malignant element of Croatian political life and society” is.
“He surely is the one, who, in the balance of his mandate, cannot reflect on anything,” he added, and assessed that Milanovic “has no achievements, no result.” He only possesses diminished political culture, vulgarity, primitivism, and personal insults to numerous actors, he added.
“He violated all ethical and legal principles, and people will punish that,” he said, asserting that those who support Milanovic also violate the Constitution.
“And that’s why the Croatian people on April 17th will tell his henchmen that they will remain in opposition for another four years, and we will send him on the path of political irrelevance. Because such a disgrace to Croatia, whether internal or external, we have never experienced before. Unfortunately, everyone knows this, and people abroad roll their eyes,” he added.
“We will not allow abnormal behavior to become something normal,” he added, referring to the song “Zabranjeno Pusenje – ma, pusti hajvan, vratit će se on kada mu bude ćeif’ (eng. let the idiot go, he will come back when he wants to). “That will not pass,” Plenkovic concluded.
Commenting on Milanovic’s messages announcing that if he becomes prime minister, Butkovic will end up in prison, Plenkovic, while noting that the government does not interfere in the work of the police, the State’s Attorney Office of the Republic of Croatia, and other judicial institutions, asserted that Milanovic has dictatorial traits.
“There is no interference, no orders, and what we hear from him are orders to bodies of criminal prosecution – we will arrest this, this one will lose everything. So, these are dictatorial traits that deny all the postulates of democracy, the division of powers, all respect for independent institutions, and de facto threaten other people,” he assessed.
Everything he says is precisely that manner of dictatorial and totalitarian behavior and that is not our world, that is not our ‘cup of tea’, as the English say, Plenkovic concluded.
During his time at Keglic, party colleagues congratulated Plenkovic on his birthday with a cake.
