Croatia PM Shakes Coalition With Triple Sacking

Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic shook the foundations of his centre-right coalition government on Thursday when he demanded the resignations of three ministers from the junior government party, the Bridge of Independent Lists, MOST.

The government voted into office by parliament in October is made up of Plenkovic's Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, MOST and MPs from national minorities.

Although it had a comfortable support of 91 out of 151 seats in parliament - 61 HDZ MPs, 14 MOST MPs and eight MPs from national minorities, along with a few others - without MOST, it could lose its majority.

Plenkovic demanded the resignations of Interior Minister Vlaho Orepic, Justice Minister Ante Sprlje and Environment Protection and Energy Minister Slaven Dobrovic because they refused to vote in support of Finance Minister Zdravko Maric ahead of a non-confidence vote initiated on April 20 by the opposition Social Democratic Party, SDP.

The opposition said Maric should quit because he had not declared a potential conflict of interest.

This was because he had not excluded himself from a voting on the troubled private company Agrokor - where he had worked before becoming a minister in the former government.

The opposition also accused Maric of taking a privileged loan from the state-owned Croatian Postal Bank as a member of its supervisory board during his term as state secretary in the Finance Ministry between 2008 and 2012.

Plenkovic called a press conference where he explained that he had asked for the ministers' removal because they would not support their colleague.

"Ministers who are unable to support their colleagues can't be members of my government. This is the only responsible move that others would also do in my...

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