Plenkovic to be Named Croatia's PM-Designate

After 23 days of negotiations with future partners in government, Andrej Plenkovic, president of the leading centre-right party, the Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, is due to be named prime minister-designate on Monday by the country's President.

The HDZ's key partner in the next government, the centre-right Most [Bridge of Independent Lists] confirmed on Thursday that it had agreed to the HDZ's term and will enter the government.

At a joint press conference in the Croatian parliament on Friday, Plenkovic and Most's president, Bozo Petrov, confirmed that they had agreed that Petrov will chair parliament for the first two years of the parliament, followed by the HDZ's candidate in the last two years of the term.

"We agreed on a model, which is the European solution, and that is that for the first two years of the term the chair will be Bozo Petrov and another two years will go to the representative of the HDZ," Plenkovic said.

"We agreed that Most will get a vice-prime ministerial position, who will be Minister of State Administration. In addition, Most will be given the ministries of the Interior, Justice, Environment and Energy. Energy will be merged with the existing Ministry of the Environment," he concluded.

Petrov said that he wanted to congratulate Most for showing readiness to change.

After last year's general elections, two parties negotiated for over 40 days before Tihomir Oreskovic was named prime minister-designate.

Unconfirmed media sources claim that in the second part of the government's term, the post will be taken by the HDZ's Gordan Jandrokovic, former foreign minister in the HDZ-led governments of Ivo Sanader and Jadranka Kosor.

Besides the Most candidate, the other three vice-prime ministers will...