Tomislav Karamarko, a candidate for Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) president, said on Friday he regretted that the initiative to choose party president on a one-member-one-vote basis came only now, describing it as "a tool to score cheap political points."
"This, unfortunately, only shows how serious some people are in their approach to the election in the Croatian Democratic Union," Karamarko said in a statement after the incumbent party president, Jadranka Kosor, announced earlier in the day that she would move amendments to the party's statute proposing that the presidential election be delayed from May 20 until July 1 and that it be held on a one-member-one-vote basis.
He welcomed the one-member-one-vote initiative, but said that it was aimed at scoring cheap political points.
Karamarko said that the proposal to change the election rules in the middle of the campaign and to separate the election of party president and vice-president was extremely worrying. "Such an abuse of the members and the party's rules is absolutely unacceptable," he stressed.
"Despite everything, I call upon all the candidates to persevere in a fair struggle, because we represent the strongest political party in the Republic of Croatia and that is our duty," Karamarko said.
