Croatian Government Issues Bonds Amidst Initiative For Recall of Prime Minister!

While televised street interviews of citizens on Croatia’s news TV programs during the past week have yielded reticence, caution, rejection, and enthusiasm, regarding the imminent and historic issue of government bonds it is, at the same time, officially touted as an avenue of much needed investment boost to Croatia’s economy and national goals. 

Croatian citizens and residents have been given the priority and opportunity to register for Croatian state bonds between 22 February and March 1, 2023; 500 euro being the minimum amount a citizen can deposit.

On 3 March 2023 corporations and institutional investors will be given the opportunity to purchase the bonds, however this opportunity will last only one day. The maturity period is two years. The interest rate is 3.25%.

Minister of Finance Marko Primorac said that the target value of the bonds issue is one billion euros, and the goal is to increase savings that citizens have in banks at relatively low interest rates and also enable citizens to participate in the public debt market.

“However, the goals are also of a broader nature, that is, through the active participation of citizens on the primary market, and then on the secondary, to further develop the capital market, encourage financial literacy, as well as other positive effects that such an issue can have,” said Primorac.

He emphasised that the minimum interest rate on bond issuance is 3.25%. The market interest rate is determined according to market circumstances, but 3.25% is the minimum coupon interest that citizens can expect, and it can be slightly higher in accordance with market circumstances.

According to the Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Croatia registration for the government bonds will be done in more than 500 bank branches which are the leading agents of the bonds issue – Erste&Steiermärkische bank, OTP bank, Privredna banka Zagreb, Raiffeisenbank Austria, Zagrebačka bank – as well as the Hrvatska poštanska banka (Croatia Postal Bank), which, at the same time, is the co-issuer of bonds together with the government. Citizens do not need to hold a bank account with any of these banks to qualify for registration and purchase of government bonds.

First round investors may be natural persons of legal age who are Croatian citizens, as well as legal persons, foreign citizens, who are residents of the Republic of Croatia. Ministry of Finance and the Zagreb Stock Exchange website are to carry important information about government bond issues and subscriptions, including for those citizens who are not clients of one of the banks that are the leading agents and co-arrangers of the issue, said Primorac, who directed citizens to the online brochure on bonds published by the Croatian Chamber of Commerce (HGK).

Upon registration, citizens can pay the desired amount of bonds immediately, they can also do it later, up to March 1, and Primorac advises that it is better to do it as soon as possible. Ministry of Finance webpage https://mfin.gov.hr as well as the Zagrebačka burza/ Zagreb Stock Exchange webpage https://zse.hr are holding all necessary information for people wishing to purchase Croatian government Bonds. It is envisaged that once sold the bonds will be listed on the stock exchange market.

The maturity of the bond will be two years.

If by any reason citizens who purchased the bonds cannot hold them until maturity and want to sell them on the secondary market, they may reportedly be faced with price changes. In that case, there is a certain minimal risk that they will not receive the amount they initially invested.

Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic pointed out that this issue of government bonds aims to dynamise the domestic capital market, as well as send a message of confidence in government bonds, in domestic public finances, and everything that has been done through systematic work and responsible management of public finances in the past years.

Whilst generally government bonds are among the safest forms of investment because of the alarming state of the economy and quite a bit of distrust in the government, there is loud scepticism on the streets of Croatia. The release of government bonds comes at the time of continued series of corruption scandals involving government ministers, of deposing old and naming new minister for development due to scandalous inaction in the past three years in reconstruction of earthquake devastated areas despite ample funds available from EU coffers, of parliamentary opposition initiatives for Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic’s recall. At this stage, it seems that the parliamentary opposition’s call for the recall, sacking, of the Prime Minister is doomed for failure for the simple reason of there being “too many political cooks” and too little tangible “incriminating” evidence that usually justifies sacking or recalls. Besides that, the parliamentary opposition is in the parliamentary minority and there are no significant numbers of representatives from the ruling majority party willing to cross the floor on the matter.  

Croatians living in Croatia are not used to bank term deposits like people living in the West; they are ¨”used to” the so-called current bank accounts.  Investing in government bonds can in a way be compared to bank term deposits and this idea alone may frighten off some people who may be reluctant to place their money out of reach for two years. Hence, one may expect that most government bond buyers will be corporate or institutional investors.

When we look at the economic and political situation in Croatia, two years if there are no major disasters are very safe. The current push from the parliamentary opposition for Prime Minister’s recall does not help nor does it provide the citizens with serenity that their money will be safe if they invest it for two years. The almost precarious financial and economic situation in Croatia, at the bottom of Europe, does cause distrust in people even if the situation as seen as stable and likely to remain stable for the coming two years or so. Being a country that depends heavily on income from tourism a successful issue of government bonds will provide a boost towards betterment and realisation of national goals. But with the President of the country, Zoran Milanovic, publicly announcing he and his family will not for various reasons be buying any government bonds one’s trust in the whole process and issue is surely shaken. That is such an awful move by a country’s president, almost an attempt to sabotage the issue of government bonds. Milanovic did not have any duty as president of the country to publicly talk of what he and his family will or will not do with their personal bank savings. He revealed it to spite the government, I’m quite certain of that. A nationally bitter and destructive vantage point indeed! Ina Vukic

Croatia: HDZ vs SDP – Pot Calling The Kettle Black

It is becoming tiring that new corruption scandals, involving the government or highly positioned officials or politicians of any creed, are unravelling just about every month before our eyes and there seems to be no end to this agony for the Croatian nation.

Almost as soon as the Croatian media published various mobile phone SMS messages exchanged between numerous public servants and the former director of the public company Croatian Forests, now a suspect with Croatian State Prosecutor’s Office for the Suppression of Organised Crime and Corruption (USKOK), the content of those messages became the main focus of discussions and demands made in parliament, February 1, 2023. The opposition, particularly SDP/Social Democratic Party accuses HDZ/Croatian Democratic Union officials, including ministers in the government, of influence peddling, fixing jobs and employment. A procedure has reportedly been initiated in which the impeachment of Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic is requested. While the ruling HDZ denies any wrongdoing that points to nepotism and corruption, the opposition comes out with the opposite assessment and calls Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic and Croatian parliament Speaker Gordan Jandrokovic, who were also mentioned in those phone messages, to account, putting the Prime Minster forth for impeachment. The SDP complaint clearly states that the HDZ brought the country to a deplorable state where without the influence of the Prime Minister and high-ranking HDZ party officials and dignitaries it is impossible to secure a job in Croatia and that it is HDZ that brought Croatia to this sorry state (HRT News Dnevnik 2, 01/02/2023).

Job-fixing, nepotism, is the root of much evil that has diseased Croatia, resulting in hundreds of thousands people leaving the country in the past decade looking for work and a decent life elsewhere. Addressing this new corruption scandal and plucking out the guilty officials and persons would be a strong start to ridding Croatia of nepotism.  

While it is certain that nepotism is one of the main problems of corruption in the labour market in Croatia under HDZ government, SDP’s opposition also did nothing to eradicate or at least significantly reduce this corrupt practice while it, itself, was in government and other power such as the Office of the President.

Pot calling the kettle black, as it is now done in the Croatian Parliament, and even in the last couple of decades, may be what people call a normal political practice between “warring” political parties vying for power, however, when it comes to eradicating corruption and nepotism this strategy should not be tolerated. It keeps suffocating Croatia from true progress in all fields of life; it is not a solution for the betterment of Croatia. It just keeps corruption alive.

The best thing that could happen for Croatian people and Croatia is to wipe the slate clean from both HDZ and SDP governments and vote in new blood at coming general elections in 2024. Both have proven that they are either incapable of making changes forward away from overwhelming corruption or that they do not want changes.

If one said that, currently and perpetually, Croatia is in a big mess, politically, economically, or otherwise, one would sadly be justified. The current Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic has maintained a stand of aggression and intolerance towards the Office of the President of Croatia regardless of who was/is in that office during his time as Prime Minister.  Of course, again, one blames the other for the intolerance; again, the pot calling the kettle black!

The same can be said for the President Zoran Milanovic and for the former President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic. They could not find a common language with Plenkovic and Plenkovic could not find it with them. The result is an abysmal image of Croatia as a nation. There is no excuse for such destructive behaviour and ways of collaborating can always be found, unless, of course, neither the Prime Minister or the President of Croatia care much about its independence and the blood spilled for that! So it may well be in their personal political interests and leanings (towards the failed former communist Yugoslav state) that they make no effort in bringing harmony to that country that has as a nation suffered so very much through the ages. 

Each will say the other one is to blame for the scandalous discord at the top echelons in the two “towers” of power in Croatia, when harmony and collaboration is required to achieve the best possible transition out of communism.

Then, last Monday Croatia’s president Zoran Milanovic criticised Western nations for supplying Ukraine with heavy tanks and other weapons in its campaign against invading Russian forces, saying those arms deliveries will only prolong the war. He said that it’s “mad” to believe that Russia can be defeated in a conventional war.

“I am against sending any lethal arms there,” Milanovic said. “It prolongs the war.”

“What is the goal? Disintegration of Russia, change of the government? There is also talk of tearing Russia apart. This is mad,” he added.

Prior to winning presidential election in 2019 Milanovic had Prime Minister between 2011 and 2016, then been disgraced as the leader of the Social Democratic Party to make a comeback as President as a left-leaning liberal candidate, a stark contrast to the middle of the road conservative government currently in power. But he has since made a turn to populist nationalism signs of which he started displaying as Prime Minister.

The fact that the Croatian government headed by Andrej Plenkovic supports Ukraine and its defence against the Russian invasion and aggression and the President does not is yet another marker for the hopeless situation Croatia is in on the road to achieving a semblance of harmony and unity.

Then, also last week, President Milanovic went on to make a grandiose statement in which he claimed that Kosovo was stolen from Serbia! The Croatian government headed by Andrej Plenkovic recognises Kosovo as an independent state and has established diplomatic relations and other cooperative processes! Milanovivc’s statement regarding Kosovo has provoked many reactions of anger and repulsion. Given that Kosovo was created as part of dissolution of former communist Yugoslavia one is thoroughly justified in being abhorred at such a statement by Milanovic. But then again, at the time, being a prominent member of the League of Communists, he was against the dissolution of communist Yugoslavia and never fought for independent Croatia. The latter part could also be said for Prime Minister Plenkovic.

Croatia is led by two politicians of communist Yugoslavia background and leanings, who never wanted its independence, its freedom, in the first place nor fought for it. A terrible paradox is being lived in Croatia. The concerning issue is that this situation and the outward discord between the Office of President and Cabinet of Prime Minister could well be a reeling out of planned action to keep Croatia unstable and keep former communist Yugoslavia looking “attractive”?

It is certainly an ugly discord, and one finds it incredulous that it is permitted to continue for so long.  

On Monday, the Croatian president expanded his narrative by saying he believes that Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula annexed by Russia in 2014, will never again be part of Ukraine.

After months of hesitation, the U.S. said it will send 31 of its 70-ton Abrams battle tanks to Ukraine, and Germany announced it will dispatch 14 Leopard 2 tanks and allow other countries to do the same.

Milanovic said that “from 2014 to 2022, we are watching how someone provokes Russia with the intention of starting this war.”

Although the presidential post is mostly ceremonial in Croatia, Milanovic is formally the supreme commander of the armed forces. One finds in Western media comments such as: Milanovic’s latest anti-Western outbursts have embarrassed and irritated Croatia’s government which has fully supported Ukraine in its fight against Russia’s aggression. Well, the aggression, the discord, the ugly fights between the two have been going on for years but the West hardly noticed. Perhaps because this discord between the Croatia’s powerful did not brush against the policies the West was implementing internationally such as that for Ukraine?  On Monday, Croatia’s Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic reacted to the president’s positions on the West and Ukraine by saying they “directly harm Croatia’s foreign policy position.” Well that’s a lukewarm reaction given the depth and intensity of the discord between the two! One would have expected Plenkovic to use much stronger words in response to Milanovic’s rants against the Western politics on Russia and its aggression against Ukraine. The coming year may indeed reveal what lies under the surface of the perpetual, tiring animosity between Croatia’s President and Prime Minister. Whatever the case, voters should not tolerate this destructive and disruptive state of discord, corruption and nepotism amidst the pretence that all is fine. True democracy should have its day! Ina Vukic   

Croatia: Internal Hybrid Warfare Against Freedom From Communism

Among today’s greatest ironies for countries that have since the fall of the Berlin Wall in late  1989 seceded from communism with the intention to transition into democracy, fought a war of independence such as Croatia that cost thousands of lives and untold damage both physical and mental, rare or non-existent is a Croatian politician in power or government since year 2000 who speaks adeptly about the values of the Homeland War which the Croatian nation must uphold above all else, adhere to and, where needed, perfect with view to serving the Croatian people and their friends who fought for freedom in any way and against communist oppression. On the contrary, the very existence of Croatian nation that fought during the 1990’s for its absolute right of self-preservation in the harsh winds of brutal Serb and former Yugoslavia Army aggression is under threat and is constantly being undermined, diminished, and attacked. This is inward hybrid war or hybrid war against own national values and identity. 

This internal aggression in Croatia is particularly visible and felt deeply painfully by masses through the constant vitriol and aggressive bickering between the President of Croatia (Zoran Milanovic) and Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic and all his government ministers. Plenkovic was embroiled in similar intolerance and lack of collaboration with the former president Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic that was and is essential for any successful nation. The governing Croatian Democratic Union in attempts to fend off increasing criticism of its governance or lack of it, has become sarcastic, cynical, and quick to ridicule any criticism or suggestion from the opposition even if it may be a good one for the nation!

Placing fake news with view to ousting political leaders intent on implementing lustration and prosecuting communist crimes perpetrated by former communist Yugoslavia operatives into the public and political arena appears to have been the tool of choice employed by former communist operatives with view to running down and/or destroy the Croatian national pride and maintain a communist Yugoslavia mentality within independent Croatia at all costs. A vivid example of this was the case of false allegations of fraud and misappropriation against HDZ leader Tomislav Karamarko, who wanted lustration and prosecution of communist crimes when he was Minister of Internal Affairs, and his wife in 2016. Fake news, of course, is a potent tool used in hybrid warfare where, in Croatia, political warfare within the related ‘grey zone’ that has seen and sees a terrible fight to retain communist mentality and communist symbolism as something Croatia should be proud of and to run down Croatian fight for independence from any kind of Yugoslavia during World War II and from communist Yugoslavia during 1990’s.

And so, ever since the 1990’s the world has seen innocent Croatian generals falsely accused of war crimes in the International Criminal Tribunal in the Hague, initiated and set up by no other that Stjepan Mesic and his followers, last president of communist Yugoslavia and leading politician in Croatia including having a stint at the Presidency for two mandates since year 2000. It took falsely accusing Croatia as aggressor in Bosnia and Herzegovina during 1990’s by not other than former communist Yugoslavia operatives. It took the rotten, biased and pro-communist Yugoslavia Croatian judiciary to mount criminal charges, always unfounded from the perspective of defence and war that had to be fought to preserve Croatian lives, and try in courts prominent Croatian defenders and leading war veterans such as Tomislav Mercep, Branimir Glavas, Mirko Norac, Duro Brodarac, Mihajlo Hrastov, the policemen in Lora in Split, while leading members of the Yugoslav Peoples’ Army and rebel Serb forces, the murderous brutal aggressor against, Croatia went unpunished and untried.

The Croatian Security Agency, SOA, in its report to the Government of the state, the Office of the President of Croatia, the Speaker of the Croatian Parliament (report available to all Croatian people in corridors of power), warned of corruption in the Croatian judiciary in 2016 and identified 20 judges by name as representing a threat to the Croatian national security. But to this day, these judges have not been dismissed; they still wield “justice” in a country whose government vows continuously and repeatedly to be fighting corruption! What does that tell us?

The governments and the country’s Presidents have had their mouths full of praise for the Croatian diaspora and its huge importance to the success of Croatia as an independent state; incessantly calling the diaspora to return! And yet there has not since year 2000 been a single plenary debate in the Croatian Parliament on the diaspora and how to best harness its knowledge and material wealth for the good of all Croatians. On the contrary the parliamentary seats for the diaspora have been cut from 12 to 3! Lately, there are several government-supported boastings about increased number of citizenship applications and expat returns under the current HDZ government. The problem with these boastings is that they omit to compare with numbers from 1980’s and 1990’s when many more returned to Croatia from the diaspora than these days. But, then again, mass disinformation or misinformation or biased information campaigns (and government in Croatia controls the mainstream media) that are aimed as showing a government in a brighter light than what it is or what it truly deserves are a characteristic found in hybrid warfare.

It has been obvious for many years that the goal of both the Croatian government and the office of the President has been and is to cancel the so-called of the Homeland War and to preserve the power borne in communist Yugoslavia that enabled criminal conversion and privatisation in Croatia post break up of communist Yugoslav. Cheap acquisitions of companies and housing were the order of the day when former communists and their friends became wealthy overnight; major banks were sold to foreign countries under non-transparent and suspicious circumstances; corruption and nepotism continued defining Croatia as they did communist Yugoslavia.   

Although the start of this internal aggression took place in wartime circumstances, particularly from around mid-1992 when Stjepan Mesic visibly began abusing his position of power in plots to overthrow President Franjo Tudjman and weaken Croatian resolve for independence from communist Yugoslavia, when the will of the people was incredibly strong for an independent Croatia and Mesic consequently ended up deposed from the position of Speaker of the Parliament in 1994,  the true dimension of that hybrid war and grey zone markings were revealed after the change of government in early 2000. The Socialist Democratic Party/SDP, former League of Communists of Croatia, won government and Stjepan Mesic, by now within his own new political party unconvincingly called Croatian Independent Democrats (HNS), won the Presidency of the country. This was a lethal combination that would see the Croatia’s fight for independence, its defence from Serb and Yugoslav aggression, prostituted and betrayed with false accusations, political twisting of facts to dangerous levels for individual veteran life and the whole nation and a proliferation of communist mentality and symbols assaulting the intellect of even most common folk let alone intellectuals and multitudes that suffered under communism.  Subsequently, the Croatian Democratic Union Party/HDZ government under Ivo Sadaner and Jadranka Kosor, Stjepan Mesic’s puppets and corrupt communist players to the core, intensified this internal aggression which is still so visible and felt under today’s Andrej Plenkovic HDZ Croatian government.

This persistent internal aggression has gained so much momentum in the past decade, when SDP and HDZ government both sought coalition with the Serb aggressor aligned SDSS political party in Croatia, neglecting purposefully values of the Homeland War, apparently in favour of a reconciliation between aggressor Serbs and victim Croats. The most recent example of this shocking government-led hybrid warfare against the values and justice of the Homeland War was the 18 November 2022 Prime Minister Plenkovic’s defiant visit to Skabrnja Massacre commemoration, together with Greater Serbia’s SDSS (Independemt Democratic Serb Party) Deputy Prime Minister Anja Simpraga. Skabranja’s  defense commander during the Serb massacre of Croat civilians and prisoners of war, Marko Miljanic, said as Croatian veterans present at the commemoration turned their backs to Plenkovic and Simpgraga, “We did not fight for this”. Internal aggression is conducted on multiple fronts and in a coordinated institutional and extra-institutional manner. The forced reconciliation without justice for the victims of the Serb aggression that the Croatian government is attempting to achieve is simply not possible nor will it ever be achieved. Justice must be seen to be done and in Croatia with such governments of communist mentality, with fraternising in government with the Croatian peoples’ and national independence enemies, with the now long-standing aggressive moves to equate victim with the aggressor, Croatia is still on a war path for its dignity, for justice, for truth and independence from Yugoslavia. It is meaningless for Simpraga having condemned the Serb perpetrators of Skabrnja massacres, for her to keep saying “We need to move forward, towards peace, tolerance and coexistence of Croats and Serbs” when she does nothing to bring the perpetrators to justice; when she laments over having to flee Croatia as a child in August 1995 without stating that Croats did not make Serbs flee but guilt for their own crimes prior to 1995 Operation Storm that liberated the part of Croatia her kin had ethnically cleansed of Croats and occupied since 1991. Plenkovic, who was relatively unknown to the Croatian public when thrust into HDZ power in 2016, under the influence and control of the leader of the Greater Serbian fifth column, SDSS’s Milorad Pupovac, appears the main proponent of the damaging thesis that a civil war was fought in Croatia during 1990’s as Serb aggression occurred, and not that Croatia was a victim of Greater Serbian aggression by Belgrade! They undermine even the International Criminal Tribunal’s thorough investigation and conclusion that it was an international conflict with Serbia (servant of Yugoslavia) as aggressor. If it was considered a civil war then no Hague prosecutions could have proceeded under the standing laws and Geneva conventions etc.

The HDZ government will often accuse those rightfully criticising them as leading hybrid warfare against Croatia when in fact it is the government who is quite guilty of hybrid warfare. And it uses not the Croatian Serbs who fought alongside Croats to defend Croatia from Serb aggression in 1990’s but those aligned and related to the Serbs who were the aggressors!  Hence, it has almost become necessary to expose the intentions of this internal aggression daily. Regretfully, such exposures do not reach the general public, because the main mainstream television and radio public service is under the strict control of the ruling Croatian-Serbian coalition. We often come across praises for communist Yugoslavia in this mainstream, produced with Croatian taxpayers’ money, but not for the victorious Homeland War that ensured Croatia’s independence. Time for some serious corrective actions when it comes to the smothered Homeland War values in the political and daily life fields in Croatia. Ina Vukic

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