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bne September 2018 Cover Story I 27
The past ten years have been tough said that she would not “comment on, overall, Croats are satisfied with inter-
interpret what one of my colleagues has said,” but added: “I don’t see a problem in upholding Christian values, because I think they’re in conformity with Muslim, or any other religious values – I’m talk- ing about the mainstream.”
Speaking at a modest circular table
in a huge reception room carpeted
with plush rugs in the Communist-era Pantovcak complex, she added: “For
us the European project is still about values, of course it’s about the common market and economic opportunities, and the four freedoms. But it’s also about human rights, it’s about civil rights, about rights of the individual and about creating the most prosperous and the freest space in the world – that offers all of these opportunities to all people and all countries equally.”
Cheering for Croatia
Grabar-Kitarovic’s international profile was raised by her appearances at the World Cup, when she regularly donned the national team’s shirt and where pos-
for Croatia – six consecutive years
of recession in 2009-14, the near- collapse of its sprawling largest private company and several others coming under serious strain, and five different prime ministers including one ousted by a corruption scandal and several that were simply disappointing. Tens of thou- sands of Croatians are emigrating every year. There has also been mounting international media criticism of alleged attempts to rehabilitate Croatia’s Second World War past.
But President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic hopes that the national football team’s thrilling run to the World Cup final this summer will reinvigorate her country of 4.2m people.
“We need to spur that optimism in other areas,” she told bne IntelliNews in an exclusive interview in the presidential offices in Zagreb. “I’m hoping that this success will provide for similar kinds of results that – for instance – Ireland had when the World Cup in Italy in 1990 gave a boost to the rise of the Celtic tiger.”
She distanced herself from the drum- beat of nationalism and xenophobia elsewhere in Europe, particularly in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and the Balkans, and called for a reassertion of “European values”, drawing on the experience of Croatia’s 1991-95 war of independence.
“Croatia is the latest member state of the EU, and one of the countries that best remembers why the European project began to begin with,” said Grabar- Kitarovic. “We remember the times of war that unfortunately for us were quite recent, we remember the times of divi- sion in Europe, of barbed wire. For quite a long time before the migration crisis, I had been warning about the erosion of values, and I had noticed that societies were closing inwards.”
Asked whether these “European values” were the sort of exclusivist “Christian values” espoused by leaders like Viktor Orban, prime minister of neighbour- ing Hungary, the Croatian president
national reactions to her summer in the spotlight, says Davor Gjenero, a political commentator.
Grabar-Kitarovic is not universally popu- lar in Croatia, however, and critics say that her wholesome international image masks a willingness to cosy up to the far right in Croatia for political reasons. For example, Velimir Bujanec, a talk show host who has been pictured parading Nazi memorabilia, was a VIP guest at her inauguration, while the president has said that controversial far-right singer Thompson – whose appearance at the World Cup celebrations in Zagreb caused controversy – is a favou- rite of hers.
On the other hand, some conservatives see her as an outsider with few real ties to the Croatian right. Grabar-Kitarovic’s description in February of those protest- ing against the visit of her Serbian coun- terpart Aleksandar Vucic as “marginal” caused a stir, given that many were war veterans and war widows.
“Croatia is the latest member state of the EU, and one of the countries that best remembers
why the European project began to begin with”
sible eschewed VVIP areas and official flights in favour of sitting with fans. Pictures of her wearing the national strip and surrounded by fellow Croatia fans flying coach on the way to Moscow went viral as a shocking show of humility and simple fun that is so unusual for the leader of a former socialist bloc country.
Her involvement in the World Cup also appears to have buoyed her domestic popularity considerably ahead of presi- dential elections due by the end of next year, in which she is widely expected to run. Polls give her a popularity rating of 67%, making her by a large margin the country’s most popular politician. While some on the left in Croatia’s polarised political landscape have accused her of behaving improperly and shamelessly using the World Cup for self-promotion,
Those close to the president, however, say that she has a commitment to the country and a desire to change it that is absent in too many Croatian politi- cians – either ideologues squabbling over history or dull technocrats with little vision.
While Grabar-Kitarovic’s constitutional powers in domestic policy are limited, she is seen as an activist president, and has been critical of the government of Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic, despite them both hailing from the right-wing Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ).
Tensions between president and gov- ernment have eased in recent weeks, however, and Grabar-Kitarovic praised the government’s handling of the crisis at Agrokor, the retail and food company
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