Zoran Milanović

Zoran Milanović (born October 30, 1966 in Zagreb) is a Croatian politician and leader of the main opposition party Social Democratic Party of Croatia (SDP).

Biography

Early life

His parents, father Stipe and mother Gina, have roots in Sinj. Zoran has a brother named Krešimir. He attended the "Center for Management and Judiciary" (an elite high-school). By his own admission, he was very lively and prone to fighting. [ [http://www.javno.com/hr/hrvatska/clanak.php?id=49361 Javno - Hrvatska ] ] In 1986, he entered the University of Zagreb in Judiciary. He learned English and Russian, as well as French.

After college, he became an intern at the Croatian Trade Court, and in 1993 got a job in the Croatian Foreign Ministry, ironically being accepted by future political rival Ivo Sanader. A year later, he went to Nagorno-Karabakh as part of a United Nations peace mission.

In 1994, he also married Sanja Musić-Milanović with whom he later had two sons, Anto and Marko.

In 1996, he became an advisor at Croatian mission to the EU and NATO at Brussels. He returned to the Foreign Ministry in 1999, at the end of his mandate.

In SDP

In 1999, he enrolled in SDP (he had not been a member of any party before that). Following SDP's win in the 2000 elections, he was given responsibility for liaison with NATO and three years later became assistant to Foreign Minister Tonino Picula. He left his post after the 2003 elections.

He was elected to SDP's Chief Committee in 2004. Two years later, he briefly became party spokesman, standing in for absent Gordana Grbić. He was also elected coordinator for the IV. election area for the upcoming 2007 elections.

Election as Party President

An extraordinary Party convention was held in Zagreb on June 2, 2007, due to the April 11 resignation (and April 29 death from kidney cancer) of the first Party President and Croatia's former Prime Minister Ivica Račan.

Milanović entered the contest, despite being considered an "outsider", because of his shorter term in the party, running against Željka Antunović (acting Party President since Račan's resignation), Milan Bandić and Tonino Picula. In the first round he led with 592, well ahead of his nearest rival Željka Antunović. [http://www.nacional.hr/articles/view/34990/] In the second round, he faced Antunović and again won by a large margin, thereby becoming president of the party.

As the new president

Milanović has already expressed his wish to see Ljubo Jurčić, the party's main economic strategist, as the next Prime Minister. Milanović will lead the party at the 2007 elections.

Since a regular SDP party convention is usually held 6 months after the Parliamentary Election (and hence will be held sometime in April or May 2008), Milanović is really on a temporary presidential term in the party.

His political future will greatly depend on the results of the Parliamentary elections in November, which he has a great chance of winning given his and his parties rising popularity.

Recently Milanović stated that Josip Broz Tito was a more positive and overall better politician than Franjo Tuđman. [ [http://www.birn.eu.com/en/86/15/3165 BIRN: Zoran Milanovic: A New Name In Croatian Politics] ]

He also received some public criticism for saying that he has some understanding for people who joined the Ustashi movement without actually knowing what it was all about. The statement has been interpreted in 2 ways: Some say that it's a cheap pre-election hunt for right wing votes, and some see it as an attempt to finally end the "Ustashi-Partisan" debate which has been going on in the society since WWII and has escalated after the fall of communism, by putting the balance in the middle.

New Croatian elections

The Croatian parliamentary election, 2007 ended very close with SDP (with 56 seats won) being only 5 mandates short of HDZ's 61 (which are strengthend by 5 from Croatian diaspora, which was one of the main campaign issues of SDP that promised eliminating the right of vote to those not living in the country).

The resulting close race left both sides in a position to form a government, provided they win over 77 of the 153 representatives. After the election, Milanović controversially made himself the candidate for prime minister over Ljubo Jurčić, despite not consulting the party's Main Committee. [ [http://www.javno.com/en/croatia/clanak.php?id=102748 Decision Was Supposed To Be Made By Main Committee] ] Despite the best election result ever, Milanović's Party remained in opposition, because the sitting Prime Minister Ivo Sanader was the first to form the majority coalition, which enabled him to stay in office.

References

* [http://www.nacional.hr/en/articles/view/33608/18/ Nacional.hr: Zoran Milanovic – The Rise of Racan's Successor]
* [http://www.javno.com/hr/hrvatska/clanak.php?id=49361 hr icon Javno.com: Biography]

External links

* [http://zoranmilanovic.sdp.hr/ Blog] language icon|hr
* [http://www.zoran-milanovic.com/ Zoran Milanovic - unofficial page] language icon|hr