POLITICAL CORUPTION

BUSINESS WORLD CULTURE VIDEO POLICY GLOBE ANALYSIS Bad autumn of 'good doctor Vilija': Did Beroš gamble political capital because of one gaffe? The recording of the Beroš-Zadravec conversation tragically exposes 30 years of HDZ rule By: Željka GodečPosted: September 10, 2020 6:34 pm Vili Robert Anic / Pool / Pixsell / Cropix The Minister of Health, Vili Beroš, could easily defend himself in court against the accusations of the former deputy director of the Vinogradska Hospital, Dijana Zadravec, that he filmed her without authorization and released the recording to the public. The video is so compromising for him and the HDZ - he declares political corruption in it by saying "the party leadership has chosen its path" - that Beros would not sound unconvincing if he claimed that he was not interested in finding out what behind-the-scenes and toxic games were taking place. in the background of public tenders. Only if Minister Beroš was even aware of its dangerous radioactive material. The recording of the Beroš-Zadravec conversation tragically exposes 30 years of HDZ rule, all the more tragic because the conversation was not led by a notorious HDZ member, but one who enjoys the reputation of "good doctor Vilija". His management of the corona crisis was richly rewarded by the citizens in the elections: with 35,607 preferential votes, more than his boss, Prime Minister Andrej Plenković (32,143). Cynics claim that the video unmasks the worst secrets of the HDZ, because of which ordinary citizens can no longer hope for the job of drivers and cleaners without the party's permission. Who was the first to sow the seeds of political corruption? Gave a sign that it can be hunted in the murky? The first president, Franjo Tudjman, bought a 1,400-square-meter villa with a garden in the most elite part of Zagreb in 1992 for a symbolic sum of 114,000 German marks, just a day before the law banning the purchase of residential buildings. after his death the state returned 400,000 kuna from the budget for part of the land? That his young descendants set up businesses and a bank, and the public was interpreted to be extraordinarily capable? However, in the 1990s, the HDZ echelon bought elite apartments to which they were not entitled, evicted bureaus with employees from the center of Zagreb to house ministers, and for those with greater appetites, the disintegration of social ownership enabled them to play at a higher level: criminal privatization. companies, pushing out workers and small shareholders on behalf of the unusually capable HDZ wives, brothers, relatives, greasy loans for which they did not have the conditions and which in the end they will not even repay. And all with minimal risk of ever coming to justice. And if they want to, they can count on the judiciary, as exemplary examples of those who fell at the altar of the fight against corruption, to pamper them by peeling potatoes, and not with serious legal penalties for which corruption could hold them for life. And finally, the political elite, this video testifies, has grown into a monster: when you want to be the director of a hospital, you will unforgivingly call the Minister of Health, threaten him with a scandal, put a noose around his supposedly suspicious property card, intimately call on the Prime Minister's name . And the minister will not even try to dismiss you with the phrase: let the institutions do their job, but will say: “Look, I want to tell you what I told you, and that is that the top of the party, including Andrej, sent you a clear message. ” The minister who knew that everything was being recorded, who put Dijana Zadravec on the loudspeaker and tried to get proof that she was pressuring him hard to "choose" her, did not withdraw his hand at any time. As if he was not aware that he was giving the participants of the meeting, and now the entire public, the crowning proof for the political modus operandi of the HDZ: "The top of the party has chosen its path", Beroš answers the question hospital director - public institution! Beroš stated this explicitly, in front of witnesses, without hesitation and destroyed his political capital, throwing his candidacy for mayor of Zagreb into the wind. There are no innocents in this conversation: Minister Beroš is deprived of the slightest ambition to remind Dijana Zadravec that the fate of the director is decided by the Board of Directors, and not by him; he takes it for granted that it is decided by the top of the party. Not a word, not even as a decor, mentions the importance of qualifications. If such talks are led by good Minister Beroš, what kind of conspiracy arrangements are the HDZ capitalists forging? There is not even that much political wisdom to invoke the laws - he invokes the prime minister. "It is clear to everyone that the HDZ is influencing who will be the director. It is acceptable for the Ministry of Health to participate in the selection of directors because it bears some political responsibility for the management of the public system. But it is unacceptable that Beros has not removed the suspicion that the candidate must be a person who is suitable - and not to him, but to the party president. ‘The top of the party has chosen the path’ in translation means: the prime minister has decided who it will be or who it will not be. It is a frightening level that the Prime Minister is dealing with this at all - in what universe does the Prime Minister have time to deal with the election of a director in the midst of a corona crisis ?! But this confirms that a farm model is in place in Croatia, according to which no position will pass under the radar and approval of the Prime Minister. It is an autocratic system of government with elements of a feudal state in which every job has become a feud. ” To make the absurd even bigger, Zadravec calls Beroš and indignantly claims that the competition is illegal - but that does not stop her from participating in it, provided that she is elected. The competition is controversial, but it is not disputed that it is forcing its choice through non-institutional channels. Zadravec is not calling Beroš because of the fight for the legality of the tender, but because of the brutal blackmail of the minister ("What about your property card?") And the wiretapping of the director's position. "It simply came to our notice then. He tells them: if you do not choose me, I will say that the competition was unstatutory. A trick often used in legal affairs. She is a candidate who tries to push herself in various ways that seem rude to me. But there is a much bigger problem for Beroš, who does not do his job - he does not decide, at least he does not dare to admit that he decides. He doesn't say, 'Dear colleague, you are very nice to me, but colleague x has better conditions than you ', than agrees that Zadravec has direct access to Plenković, so the case will be resolved with the Prime Minister. It’s not a scandal per se, but it’s a waste of resources: I can’t imagine him dealing with it. However, if he is already dealing with it, I would like to know whether someone submitted a summary of the competition with the two best candidates and their references to Plenković, or whether the choice comes down to who knows Plenković better. And this is probably the latter, ”said the political analyst I wonder if someone then submitted to Plenković a summary of the competition with the two best candidates and their references, or the choice comes down to who knows Plenković better. And this is probably the latter, ”said the political analyst I wonder if someone then submitted to Plenković a summary of the competition with the two best candidates and their references, or the choice comes down to who knows Plenković better. And this is probably the latter, ”said the political analystŽarko Puhovski . There is no doubt that Beroš gave his boss a big headache: the "new" HDZ, which Plenković is trying to present as a party free of corruption, has again been publicly denounced as the same old party. Not so long ago, in the spring, Plenković summed up the results of his first term. Under public pressure, he was forced to remove a third of the ministers from the government last year. He announced a relentless showdown with corrupt officials. Ironically, now his purest minister carelessly informs the citizens that the results of public tenders for public services are decided by the "party leadership", "Andrej". At the end of his term, Plenković had 15 dismissed ministers, 38 total heads at the head of the ministries, plus 33 political converts who kept his quorum. In most overthrown by favor or force from ministerial chairs, the same common denominator is: swindling with contracts, squares, misrepresentation of property because it would truly entail embarrassing questions about the origin of property, abuse of position and authority for one's own enrichment and greed. However, until Vilija Beroš, no one honored the public with a conversation in which it is clearly made known that the power of the Prime Minister and the head of the HDZ is absolute. "We can conclude that all public functions in the country have been captured by the HDZ, which assigns public functions and public jobs, whether it is a school, a company or a hospital, as lazy to their party followers. Beroš gave evidence for speculations that everything that is worth anything in the country is in the hands of the HDZ ", says Sandra Benčić. Davorko Vidovićhe ironically says that it was a process that began not in 1990 but in 1945. He admits that his party, the SDP, also produced such a climate and reveals the pressures he was under during his ministerial term. And why the "corruption permit" is depressing for the whole society: "Given the fact that the HDZ was actually created as a project of Udba and the old party cadre, he completely inherited the methodology and technique of his political activities from the former Party." The late Franjo Tudjman could not move away from that; he was the progenitor of the concept of running the HDZ as a former Party. It is in vain to swear that only God is above the Parliament when the political and real power is in the Presidency and the headquarters of the HDZ, on the Square of Croatian Greats, and not in the Banski dvori. ” In the first ten years of its rule, the HDZ analyzes Vidović, concretized the party into two key identifying elements: nationalism and clientelism. "The latter was inherited from the former regime in which there was no serious progress for those who are not part of the party cadre. The recording of the Beroš-Zadravec conversation shows that in 30 years we have not turned into a true parliamentary democracy and managed to shake off that historical heritage. " Žarko Puhovski, a political analyst, believes that the Beroš-Zadravec video, which shows that the HDZ has control over the public tender, is not a reason for scandal. For him, the crucial issue is the criteria, not who decides: “Whoever has power on behalf of the state decides how the state hospital will function. Well that is the meaning of power! I don't see any problem with that. The only problem is whether the professional criteria are met. In a decent state it is not conceivable that just because someone is a member of the party to be elected director. We have it. But the thing is confused: it is not a question of who decides, but how, whether there is a qualification. If you can say that Ms. Zadravec has more work than me, more management experience or fewer employee objections, then everything is fine. As the private owner decides who will be the director, so on behalf of the state, the ministry decides who will run the hospital, but according to publicly known criteria that everyone must adhere to: expertise, experience, cooperation. But only at the level of the director, not at the others! ” The real question for the prime minister is: if the fight against corruption is real, how is it that every now and then one of his close associates is caught by the media not with a finger, but with his whole body dipped in jam? What kind of authority does it have that no one is afraid to be caught? Benčić has the answer: “The Prime Minister should not fight corruption, but should provide enough money in the budget so that this work can be done freely by independent institutions. As soon as he says he is fighting, it is already a sign of alarm.