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UNCLAS        ZAGREB 01460

SIPDIS
R 081429Z DEC 06

FM AMEMBASSY ZAGREB
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 7022
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 ZAGREB 001460 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL PGOV HR
SUBJECT: ELECTIONS DUE IN 2007 ALREADY SHAPING CROATIAN POLITICS 
 
REF: Zagreb 1405 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary and comment:  Early elections remain unlikely as 
the ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) holds on to enough 
coalition partners to pass a budget and approve (with additional 
opposition support) continued overseas troop deployments. 
Nevertheless, general elections are due by November 2007; as neither 
the HDZ nor major opposition Social Democrats (SDP) can currently 
count on enough votes to form a government alone, each will almost 
certainly have to seek partners.  With eleven months to go, smaller 
parties are already actively considering pre- and post-election 
alliances and working to increase their chances of becoming part of 
a ruling coalition.  This competition over the middle-of-the-road 
votes up for grabs will probably act to moderate political rhetoric 
from the left and right, and ensures that the next government, like 
the present one and its predecessor, will keep Croatia on the path 
to the EU and NATO.  End summary and comment. 
 
¶2. (U) Prime Minister Sanader told the press in late November that 
elections were due only in November 2007, and not before.  He had 
made the same statement before, but this time he repeated it in 
reply to far-right Croatian Party of Rights (HSP) President Anto 
Djapic -- thus far Sanader's informal ally -- who had expressed his 
strong disagreement with Sanader and his government for keeping his 
local coalition partner Branimir Glavas in custody over war crimes 
charges (Reftel).  This event marked the return of the HSP to the 
opposition benches, trimming the ruling coalition's majority down to 
the bare minimum. This majority is enough to enact the budget and 
pass most of the laws the government needs to pass, but the HDZ will 
have to depend more heavily than ever on its junior partners: 
liberals, pensioners and national minorities, at a time when any of 
those may well decide to look the other way for new allies. 
 
Strange bedfellows: Liberals and Farmers 
---------------------------------------- 
 
¶3. (U) The nominally liberal Croatian Social Liberal Party (HSLS) 
has already made the first step out of coalition with the HDZ.  In 
October the HSLS signed a general agreement of cooperation with the 
traditional and conservative Croatian Peasant Party (HSS).  The 
agreement was largely motivated by an extensive survey of voters 
that showed that a) the two parties' voters would like to see such 
cooperation and b) many respondents desired a stronger "political 
center" which both parties claim as their environment. The HSLS 
simply needs such a coalition to make the five percent threshold, 
while the HSS needs a junior partner if it wants to increase 
significantly its representation in Parliament, because the formula 
of seat distribution works to the advantage of the biggest parties. 
 
 
¶4. (SBU) More than a month after the signing of the HSS-HSLS 
agreement, its scope and contents remain unclear. The parties have 
undertaken to uphold each other's initiatives in Parliament, but no 
joint action has materialized yet. It is equally unclear to which of 
the two biggest parties the HSS and HSLS would eventually turn for 
coalition. The HSS is now in opposition, and thus implicitly closer 
to the SDP; the HSLS is part of the HDZ-led government and its 
relations with its one-time ally SDP are still upset. HSLS Vice 
President Zlatko Kramaric told the Embassy his party was "closer to 
Sanader, but not necessarily to the HDZ."  This is about as "clear" 
as other HSLS moves, such as the above-mentioned vote on Glavas 
where the HSLS first publicly criticized Sanader and his HDZ for 
having second thoughts about Glavas's detention and then didn't even 
bother to show up when the vote was taken.  If it perhaps lacks 
clarity, the HSLS is certainly not without ambitions. Rather than 
going to either of the two big players, the HSLS plans to continue 
adding other parties to its coalition with the HSS, Kramaric said. 
He hopes that the left-of-center Croatian Peoples Party (HNS), 
pensioners party (HSU) and regional Istrian Democratic Party (IDS) 
would follow suit and join them in building the "Third Way," a group 
that would be in a position "dictate terms" both to the HDZ and SDP. 
 
 
¶5. (SBU) The HSS logic seems to be more down-to-earth.  They plan to 
focus their campaign on just a few topics: agriculture, pension and 
health reform, decentralization and the protection of land and sea 
from "foreign exploitation."  HSS Vice President Bozidar Pankretic 
doesn't view this last one as Euro-skepticism but rather 
Euro-realism, as he explained to the Embassy in mid-November. 
However, his President Josip Friscic said at a party assembly just a 
few days later: "We are not Euro-skeptics but if we have to give 
kilometers of our sea to Italy in exchange for its hand to lead us 
into the EU, we have to say 'no, thanks!' If we lose the sea, we 
will have to give up our land and forests tomorrow, and our people 
are next the day after so we will all end up as servants."  This 
rhetoric is clearly used to attract HDZ voters disappointed with the 
GOC's pro-European policies - basically the same nationalist 
constituencies that the HSP is catering to.  In this way, it makes 
sense that the HSS was almost as strongly against Glavas's detention 
as the right-wing HSP.  The question is how far right the HSS can go 
and still purport to appeal to the "political center." 
 
Centrists still assessing potential alliances 
--------------------------------------------- 
¶6. (SBU) One of the parties that the "Third Way" reckons with is the 
Croatian People's Party - Liberal Democrats (HNS).  The same parties 
that count on them criticize them for being too active in 
campaigning for government offices way too early and way too 
independently.  In September and October, HNS Central Committee 
President and Varazdin County Prefect Radimir Cacic toured the 
country promoting himself as the next Prime Minister.  His potential 
partners objected to Cacic's campaign at two levels. First, there is 
no race for Prime Minister in Croatia; the position is selected from 
the party that does best at the elections.  Second and more 
important is the size of the HNS vis-`-vis its potential partners. 
No popularity survey gives the HNS more that ten percent, and that 
seems rather generous.  Still, HNS continues to center most of its 
political activity around Cacic as a model prime minister.  Also, 
party president Vesna Pusic has publicly marketed herself as the 
next foreign minister, which angered her potential partners left and 
right.  "She is well-qualified for the job, but you simply don't do 
it. These things are always a matter of political agreement among 
partners," said SDP Executive Board Member Zoran Milanovic to the 
Embassy earlier in November.  Yet, the HNS is the only significant 
political party that the SDP can surely count as a partner. 
Politically, these two parties belong to the same part of the 
spectrum and all they need to work out is personal differences, 
especially in the city of Zagreb where sparks from their past 
frictions can still be seen. 
 
Social Democrats considering options 
------------------------------------ 
 
¶7.  (SBU) The latest credible survey showed in late November that 
the two biggest parties - HDZ and SDP - have lost some support, but 
are still about twice as strong as anyone behind.  The HDZ is 
somewhat above twenty percent, and the SDP is somewhat below.  One 
reason for the SDP's decline in November is probably mainly due to 
an affair surrounding one of the party's vice presidents - MP and 
former justice minister Ingrid Anticevic Marinovic.  The scandal 
broke out in relation to the way her husband Marko Marinovic handled 
a case as a defense lawyer, but it grew to implicate his wife Ingrid 
Anticevic as an alleged abettor in a potential corruption case from 
2002 when she was the Minister of Justice.  As a result she resigned 
as party VP, but damage was already done since the SDP chose 
corruption as a main tool to thump the government with.  As internal 
issues are expected to dominate the campaign, the SDP will also 
campaign on its "natural" issues, such as jobs, labor, pension and 
health reform.  The party has already appointed "coordinators" for 
each of the ten election districts, whose job is to stay in touch 
with the constituencies explaining the party program.  Zoran 
Milanovic -- who is in charge of the fourth district in northern 
Slavonia -- thinks this form of fieldwork will eventually give them 
advantage over the HDZ.  This advantage is key, Milanovic argues: 
whichever of the two parties wins a plurality, it will win the HSS, 
HSLS, HSU (pensioners) and minorities to its side.  And that should 
be enough to form a government. 
 
BRADTKE