The Zivi Zid party on Sunday objected the closing down of the Sisak refinery, saying that the plan was part of a political agreement favouring the Hungarian oil and gas group Mol.

Addressing reporters outside the offices of the Ina oil company in Zagreb with his party colleague Ivan Pernar, Zivi Zid leader Ivan Vilibor Sincic said that Mol had announced that it would close the Sisak refinery and the Rijeka refinery in 2015 and 2017, but that due to resistance, the shutdown had been moved to 2018 and 2019.

Ina, which is owned jointly by Croatia and the Hungarian oil and gas group, announced last Wednesday that it would concentrate its refining business in Rijeka, while the Sisak refinery would be converted into an industrial centre focusing on other activities.

“They will do it eventually. It’s not in their interest to produce and process oil here. Mol has refineries in Slovakia and Hungary and the plan is to close down our refineries and turn them into storage facilities for finished products from Hungary, to be sold on petrol stations and in ports in Croatia,” said Sincic. “That was always MOL’s strategy, that is why they came here and that is the reason for INA’s current situation.”

He claimed that this was a result of a political agreement favouring MOL.

“Big money must have been given for this to happen… We are still trying (former PM) Ivo Sanader, it’s a never-ending story, and that organised chaos suits very much both the Croatian side and the Hungarian side,” Sincic claimed.

Zivi Zid doesn’t trust President Grabar-Kitarovic, her former advisor Radeljic or SOA

Grabar-Kitarovic fired her domestic policy advisor, Mate Radeljic, her office said in a press release on Friday.

Commenting on Radeljic’s claims that her decision to dismiss him was conveyed to him by a staffer of the Intelligence-Security Agency (SOA) who also threatened him, the Zivi Zid officials said that they did not trust the president, Radeljic or the SOA, with Sincic saying that the Radeljic case was about a conflict between factions in the ruling HDZ party.

“They are using state institutions to discredit one another. On the other hand, that’s good, because it reveals the truth and the dirt we knew was there. That must happen so that citizens can see that this is not a law-based country and that things happen because of a phone call by a power-wielder to the police or the SOA,” Sincic said.