Speaking at a session of the SDP Main Committee, Milanovic said a turbulent and unsuccessful year was behind Croatia and that at its close "we are watching the resolution of a comedy, a drama, even a farce that I don't want to talk about, because I don't think it's the main topic which Croatia and the SDP should deal with at the moment."

He said the strongest opposition party had been warning about the government's wrongdoings for years and that it had taken too long to start solving "this deep social problem."

"It took too long and today we are watching how Croatia is embarrassing itself with everything that's going on. On the one hand, the institutions have finally started working, while on the other, we can only wonder what would have happened had they been working all these years, had people done their job honestly and uncompromisingly, had they enforced the law. That's why I can promise that, if the SDP gets the opportunity to run Croatia, what we have been seeing in recent years will never happen again. No way," said Milanovic.

He underlined that the SDP and its partners in the Alliance for Change, if they won next year's election, guaranteed that there would be no place for malfeasance.

"That's a difficult promise, but much easier than some castles in the air, impossible growth rates, three-times-seven programmes - a seven per cent unemployment rate, a seven per cent economic growth rate, seven big economic projects. Instead, we are seeing only seven big arrests, but that's something, too."

Milanovic reminded his party colleagues that 2011 was an election year, urging them to be persistent and patient, not to get carried away by survey results, but to prove themselves to voters every day, "in parliament, in local and regional units ... in the community we live in."

"What has happened in the judiciary is water under the bridge. What will happen, how many more webs will be untangled over the next year, we'll see. It's up to us to be persistent, patient, to do our job, not to be haughty... in feeling the pulse of the people," he said.

The SDP and its partners guarantee citizens a decentralised state and more autonomy in local financing and decision-making, he said.

Milanovic voiced hope that Croatia would wrap up its European Union accession talks and sign the accession treaty next year, saying this would give an entirely new dimension to the nation and Croatia's sovereignty and outlook. "More than ever in our history, we will be masters of our destiny, our conscience, our spirit and our own wallet," he said, adding that partner relations with other EU countries would not mean they respected Croatia less or that Croatia had given up fighting for its national interests.

"It's not easy to establish a balance, a harmony between all those goals, but the closer we are to a harmony between the private and the public, the more successful we are as a society," Milanovic said.