The result of Croatia's presidential elections in which Social Democratic candidate Ivo Josipovic and Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandic compete may determine the pace of the country's integration with the European Union, the US Bloomberg news agency reported on Friday, two days before the run-off.
"Croatian voters elect their next president Jan. 10, and their choicebetween opposition candidate Ivo Josipovic and Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandic maydetermine how quickly the former Yugoslav nation joins the EuropeanUnion."
The news agency quoted Damir Grubisa, European-affairs professor at ZagrebUniversity of Political Sciences, as saying that "the choice of Josipovicwould mean a faster pace for Croatia's path toward the EU and a quickeradaptation to EU standards."
"If Bandic wins, that would slow the EU negotiating process, because hewould insist on debating problems that have already been overcome,"Grubisa said.
The professor said that it looks like the 52-year-old Josipovic "wouldnot interfere with the government's or parliament's business, but he would be auseful adviser to them."
"Bandic, on the other hand, wants to expand the president's powers andhe seems to want to take over and run the economy," Grubisa added.
According to Bloomberg, "Croatia is struggling with its worst economicdecline since the breakup of Yugoslavia in 1991. The global financial crisisstopped credit flows, and consumption and investment tumbled."
The news agency cited figures from the Croatian National Bank showing GrossDomestic Product's downturn of 5.7% in the third quarter. The bank's governor ZeljkoRohatinski was quoted as saying that the "GDP is set to fall about 6percent in 2009."
Bloomberg believes that Josipovic "might also ease relations towardSerbia, with which Croatia fought a war in the early 1990s after the breakup ofYugoslavia."
The report recalled that the ruling Croatian Democratic Union's presidentialcandidate did not make it to the run-off.
The HDZ representative Andrija Hebrang finished third in the first round,which prompted Ivo Sanader, the predecessor to the current Prime MinisterJadranka Kosor "to announce he's returning to politics. Kosor thenexpelled Sanader from the party, saying his return might have caused heradministration to fall and stopped EU entry talks."
The report also cited findings of a poll by the Median pollster showing that"Josipovic, 52, backed by the largest opposition group, the SocialDemocrats, leads Bandic, a 54-year-old independent, after a campaign dominatedby corruption and the economy".
