ZAGREB, CROATIA - - I am not sure that we should be wasting time on stories about measures against the recession because high school graduates got the task to save Croatia – the president of the Croatian People’s Party (HNS), Radimir Cacic, told reporters. 

Cacic thinks that the government made no progress and, judging by what he said, the Croatian government’s measures are nothing but children’s fairytales: unfounded and remain as promises as usual. Cacic claimed that the HNS had drafted anti-recession measures in November, four months before the government did, slamming the government’s long delay.

Cacic refuted Finance Minister Ivan Suker’s claims that the Peljesac bridge will be built without using the state’s money, saying that what Suker insulted the intelligence of Croatian citizens.

- Who will then finance the bridge? The Holy Spirit? – Cacic asked.

Croatia is in dire straits. The government is finally ready to admit the facts and now it will curb expenses it created itself.

Radimir Cacic

The HNS head thinks that the true measure regarding the budget would be if the government was to say that the budget would be decreased by ten percent for a month.

Cacic also believes it is high time to begin investing into agriculture, whose development has been stagnating for 19 years already. He suggested raising the quality of produced goods, as well as stimulating production in that sector.

He agrees with the idea of freezing salaries in the public sector, which he backed with the example of Slovenia, where salaries were first decreased by 4.5 percent and then frozen. He slammed suggested subsidies for shipyards because “eight billion dollars will be paid by citizens”.

- Production should be stimulated, not consumption! What decreasing of interest rates? Interest rates should be increased. (Croatian National Bank governor) Rohatinski cannot get help with such a government. The government primarily has to pay its own debts and when it does that, the situation will be excellent – Cacic said.

He described the idea of introducing excise duties for mobile telephony as a frivolous attempt because “there are a hundred different ways to fill the government budget, for example, introducing excise duties for door knobs and chimneys”.