Croatia begins voting in the presidential elections, with Milanovic favorite to retain this position

Croatia’s President Zoran Milanovic, a populist who has become a counterweight to the ruling party’s historic dominance, is starting as the favorite in the country’s presidential elections that started this Sunday with the prospect of a second round.

Milanović58, goes to the polls with the support of the social democratic opposition against his great rival, Professor Dragan Primorac, backed by the conservative Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) of the country’s Prime Minister, Andrej Plenkovic.

Croatia’s presidency is not just a purely ceremonial function: its voice carries some weight in foreign policy and defense, and it acts as commander-in-chief of the armed forces. The current head of state is a critic of Western intervention Ukraine in its war with Russia, although it has also unequivocally condemned the invasion of Moscow’s forces, according to the latest polls on Friday, it has a voting intention of 37%, 17 points ahead of Primorac, but without reaching 50 percent, which guarantees an immediate victory. Six other candidates are participating in these elections without any chance of advancing to the second round, scheduled for January 12: Miro Bulj, Tomislav Jonjic, Ivana Kekin, Branka Lozo and independents Marija Selak Raspudic and Niko Tokic Kartelo.

Prime Minister Plenkovic has devoted the election campaign to criticizing the president’s position on the war in Ukraine and has accused Milanovic of serving Russian interests and “destroying Croatia’s credibility” in the eyes of NATO and the European Union. Moreover, the campaign was also marked by the scandal of corruption That cost his position to former Health Minister Vili Beros, who dismissed Plenkovic in November last year, shortly after he was arrested amid an investigation for alleged corruption that also affected officials and doctors.