Ljubo Jurčić

Ljubo Jurčić (born 1954) is a Croatian economist and former Croatian Minister of the Economy.

Ljubo Jurčić is a Herzegovinian Croat born on March 20, 1954 in a village Ružići, near Grude, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Yugoslavia. He graduated from the Zagreb Economic University and became a doctor of economic science.

Although he was not a member of the Social Democratic Party of Croatia (SDP) party, he was closely aligned with them as an non-partisan economic expert. As head of SDP's Council for Economy and Development, Jurčić formulated SDP's economic strategy that will be implemented should the party win the 2007 elections. Due to his importance in this project, he has been named by the Social Democrats' Main Committee (after a proposal by party chairman Zoran Milanović) as SDP's candidate for Prime Minister of Croatia.

This decision was later reverted, with electoral campaing still running,and he was substituted by Milanović's itself, who was believed being more popular figure, itself. It turned to be a definitive error, one of the many that empaired final phases of SPDcampaing, leading to an overall and unexpected victory of Ivo Sanader's HDZ, who is now Prime Minister of Croatia.

Lijubo Jurčić remained altogheter in SPD ranks, still showing his definite non-partisan attitude, publicly and wholeheartedly defending ultra-nationalist singer Marko Perković Thompson from accusation arisen after his incredibly successful 30/5/2008 concert in Ban jelacic square [http://www.javno.com/hr/hrvatska/clanak.php?id=152694] .

References

* [http://www.sdp.hr/klub_zastupnika/dr_sc_ljubo_jurcic Short biography at official SDP pages]