The current Croatian Parliament will start its last session on September 28 and the session is expected to last until October 21 or the end of the month if necessary, when the Parliament will be dissolved ahead of a campaign for parliamentary elections set by the ruling coalition government for December 4, Parliament Speaker Luka Bebic said after a session of the Parliament Presidency on Tuesday.
Bebic said that the agenda of the forthcoming session covered 92 items and that considering its size, he would use his powers to have items deemed to be more important discussed sooner.
Asked if he expected the parliament to be able to work normally in the current pre-election period or turn into a political arena, Bebic said the parliament would be in session only one month and then be dissolved, and that considering its busy agenda, there would not be much time for campaigning.
Reporters were also curious if he had read Croatia's EU accession treaty which the government, after receiving it from Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk last Saturday, sent to the presidents of state and parliament and the National Committee overseeing Croatia's EU accession talks.
Bebic said that his colleagues "with a better knowledge of English" had informed him of some of the items in the treaty.
"I hope the document will be translated and published very soon so that Croatian citizens could learn everything they should know. The sooner it happens, the better," Bebic said.
He added that before going to a referendum to decide on Croatia's accession to the EU, citizens should be informed as much as possible about what EU entry would bring.
Asked if citizens had been given enough time for that, Bebic said that a number of round table discussions had been held in parliament at which representatives of the nongovernmental sector had the chance to discuss important questions from the negotiating process and put forward proposals.
