Almost eight months before the upcoming local elections, the three strongest opposition parties – SDP, HSS and HNS – are on the brink of forming a large coalition and working together to rival HDZ. Though until recently it was thought that the opposition would run in two blocks, SDP-HSS and HNS-Libra-LS, in recent weeks, new contacts have been made among the party leaders and the decision to counter HDZ together is increasingly close. This was confirmed for Nacional last week by leading members of all three parties.

The first informal discussions on the topic were held back in June when Vesna Pusić met with Ivica Račan and Zlatko Tomčić. The presidency of HNS decided then that they were open to the idea of a coalition with SDP and HSS, primarily as they are aware that with weak partners such as Libra and LS in all combinations they remain the third strongest political force in the country. However, the June talks did not result in any deals, primarily due to the reservations of the Social Democrats, who did not want to expand their coalition with HSS. They fear that they will face many problems in making up the ballot with HSS, for SDP believes that the ballot should be made up proportional to the last election results, while Tomčić believes that that party’s success at the local and county elections in 2001 be respected. If the current situation is validated, Tomčić and his associates would receive a lot less than they would like, but despite this, HSS is the main advocate of a large coalition and including HNS into the formal opposition triumvirate.

The realistic situation is quite different. This was confirmed on Sunday, 5 September at the repeated local elections in Požega, where SDP, to everyone’s surprise, including their own, took 45% of the vote and pounded HDZ. Party headquarters in Zagreb has not seen such satisfaction in a long time. SDP was in particular pleased that they won local elections in Slavonia, which HDZ considers to be its election stronghold. With the help of Defense Minister Berislav Rončević, HDZ brought down the city government. However, this aroused such great animosity among the local population that this time they gave even more support to SDP. This good result is also in part thanks to the decision by Social Democrats to put distinguished physicians and well known people in Požega on the ballot, even though they are not formally party members. It seems as though this will be the formula for the local elections, which will be maximally personalized, while many of the leading spots on the ballots will be given to publicly recognized people, and not local party members.

The problem is the HSS fiasco and the fact that the HNS-LS ballot which did not cross the election threshold. Such failures will certainly form an additional argument for SDP in their negotiations on future election ballots. Last Tuesday, a secret meeting was held between the party groups – Tonino Picula, Zlatko Komadina and Igor Dragovan from SDP, and Željko Pecek, Josip Friščić and Stanko Grčić from HSS. Though both parties have stressed that these are not the teams which will decide the composition of the ballots, their definite appearance will depend on the results of the work of this two-party working group.

Inasmuch, possible cooperation with HNS remains open, and that party has received open offers to join the SDP-HSS coalition. “A large coalition which will oppose HDZ has become an issue of national interest, and that has to overrule party desires,” stated Vesna Pusić for Nacional. Therefore, she is set to again meet with Tomčić and Račan in the coming days, and to try to convince them that the creation of a triumvirate represents the only sure path to victory. Partial coalitions resulted in a fiasco in November 2003 when these three parties together received 180,000 more votes that HDZ, but were left far behind the current government in the number of parliamentary seats. “I am certain that a joint ballot between of our three parties will guarantee a victory in all the large cities and will win in the majority of counties. We must not repeat the mistake we made in the parliamentary elections when we handed HDZ the victory, and now we have to watch how their incompetent government is destroying Croatia,” stated Vesna Pusić.

Zlatko Tomčić presented the same idea when he confirmed HSS’s openness for cooperation with other parties, and not only with SDP. “Our party is willing to form a coalition with everyone, only HDZ is not an option. We have agreed to a joint ballot with SDP, however, I believe that including HNS would result in an exceptional synergistic effect. That does not mean that we need to form coalitions with all 560 local administrations, but there is no logical reason against a joint ballot in all the counties and their centers. Together we will win in over half of the election districts,” predicted Tomčić.

Over the summer, HSS reached a consensus over a coalition with Račan’s party and the only unconfirmed county is the Dubrovnik-Neretva County. To follow are discussion on ballot places, where Tomčić will do all he can to ensure his people keep their positions in the counties where his is the ruling party. That will be quite difficult as HSS holds eight counties, which is more than the current voter support for that party. Under such circumstances, three various concepts will have to be harmonized in compiling the ballots: HSS is leaning towards the 2001 election results, SDP on last year’s elections, and HNS would prefer to organize opinion polls directly before the elections to indicate the actual strength of each of the members of the future coalition. Until then, Tomčić will have to get rid of certain dissident appearances in his party, such as that by Damir Novotny last week, former head of the Zagreb HSS branch, who stated that he supported a move away from the rural votes and turning more towards an urban voter base. Tomčić holds such a statement to be irresponsible and claims that rural areas and their populations will continue to be the main voter base for HSS in the future. Just prior to meeting with National’s report, Tomčić was pleased with the message by Ante Markov, head of the Dalmatian branch of HSS, who denied the news that he had also supported the idea of distancing the party from the rural vote.

Regardless of the fact that these are individual statements, there is obviously an understanding in HSS that unlimited support for the demands of the farmers are begin to present the party as Europhobic to the public. Furthermore, such an image in their strongest partner also does not suit SDP, even though everyone in the party leadership is openly avoiding criticizing any of HSS’s standpoints. However, while Premier, Račan was very reluctant to support the idea of creating an economic-fishing belt in the Adriatic, as he knew that would result in an unnecessary conflict with Italy and Slovenia. He gave in only to avoid compromising the government’s policies in the pre-election period, however, on several occasions, he informally expressed his regrets over the HSS foreign policy game. At the local elections, the emphasis will not be on such topics, however, it is very important to the SDP leadership that their most important partner does not compromise them with anti-European ideas.

If one can judge by the reactions of some of Račan’s closest associates, it would appear that SDP is not overwhelmed by the idea of creating a large coalition. Months were needed to reach a formal agreement with HSS, and SDP fears that brining HNS in would only further complicate the situation. The main question is whether or not the relations between the parties is so good at the local level that could make a coalition possible. If such a coalition was forced by the party headquarters, that could lead to a revolt which would compromise the formation of the coalition.

A particular paradox would exist in an attempt to create a joint ballot between SDP and HNS in Zagreb. Though this coalition is still function to some extent in the capital city, it is simply impossible to imagine a ballot in which Milan Bandić and Srećko Ferenčak or Vladimir Velnić and Morana Paliković-Gruden would be side by side on the ballot. Furthermore, HNS have already warned several times that they will not support Milan Bandić as candidate for mayor, even though he is SDP’s number one choice for that position. Since he made the huge mistake of publicly attacking the Municipal Court for its ruling in the Zagrepčanka case, Milan Bandić has been annoying to even his closest associates. He now makes public appearances only occasionally, all in an attempt to keep quiet and keep from angering Račan. If he continues like this, he will likely achieve his prime political ambition – to return to his position as Zagreb mayor. He also has HSS support for this, as on a joint ballot HSS will finally re-enter the Zagreb City Council after several election failures, and would like receive two or three Council seats. In return, Zlatko Tomčić will try to convince Vesna Pusić to support SDP’s candidate, even if that is the loathed Milan Bandić.

And finally, in several days time, Ivica Račan and Milan Bandić will begin their joint tour of the SDP branches in the Zagreb neighbourhoods. With that, they want to convince the party members that there are no conflicts within the party and that the Zagreb organization enjoys the full support of the party leadership. Considering that the majority of Zagreb neighbourhoods have between 50 and 60,000 residents, SDP has concluded that they need to begin their campaign this autumn. Knowing how Račan and Bandić think, we can expect that both men will be satisfied with this tour: Račan will receive the plebian support of the membership, while Bandić will again prove to be a good organizer. If they can achieve a consensus, they will continue to rule in Zagreb for the next four years, regardless of whether the HDZ candidate in 2005 will be Jadranka Kosor, Marina Matulović-Dropulić or someone else.

Just to what extent it will be difficult to harmonize the standpoints of various parties was seen in HSS’s newest announcement that they will propose a law forbidding the sale of property to foreigners. “We would permit leases or concessions on land and property, but we have to end the sale of Croatia to foreigners. And please, do not say that with this we are closing the doors to the EU for some of its Member States have similar laws,” commented Zlatko Tomčić last week for Nacional. The HSS president sees the financially weak position of Croatian citizens and their willingness to sell property to foreigners as the main reason for proposing this law which would objectively restrict foreign investments. For example, a hectare of agricultural land in Austria costs about 7500 Euro, while here it is 1500 Euro, and therefore we can expect that foreigners will soon begin to buy cheaper Croatian land. “That is unacceptable and therefore we should permit only concessions, or make foreigners take Croatian citizenship so that they pay taxes like the rest of us,” warned Tomčić.
Though they have not yet seen the HSS proposal, SDP is not thrilled with this new initiative by its coalition partner. Ivica Račan and the Croatian diplomats still recall the “slap in the face” they received throughout Europe while defending the decision to create an economic belt in the Adriatic Sea. A ban on selling property to foreign citizens would not result in such a reaction, but some of Račan’s consultants believe that this is yet another initiative which has no rational justification. However, due to his partnership with Tomčić, SDP will not oppose the proposal once it comes to the Parliament. It is fortunate in this case that HDZ has a comfortable majority and will certainly not permit such a law to pass.