President Ivo Josipovic on Wednesday received representatives of the non-governmental organisations "Pravo na grad" (The Right to a City) and "Zelena akcija" (Green Action), which are opposed to HOTO Group's construction project in Zagreb's Cvjetni Trg square.
"We presented our suspicions about irregularities in the whole project and asked the President for support within his constitutional powers," Tomislav Tomasevic of Green Action said after the meeting.
Tomasevic said they had asked the president for "assistance in communication with government institutions in order to solve this problem more easily, to which the President agreed."
He said that Rudolf Holub, chairman of the Austrian parliamentary commission investigating the Hypo Alpe Adria Bank, would come to Zagreb on Thursday at their invitation to present his knowledge of how HOTO Group had been granted a loan for the Cvjetni Trg project.
HOTO Group, a private company owned by Tomislav Horvatincic, is building a residential and business complex, including an underground car park, in Cvjetni Trg in central Zagreb. The project has sparked public protests.
The NGOs Green Action and the Right to a City have been organising protests in Cvjetni Trg square and nearby Varsavska street against the construction of an entrance to the underground garage in a pedestrian zone.
