Construction Minister Branko Bacic on Monday visited the area of Velika Gorica, south of Zagreb, where replacement homes are being built for people whose houses suffered extensive damage in the March 2020 earthquake that hit Zagreb and its environs.

Bacic visited the construction site of a replacement home for the Djuran family in Mraclin, as well as the 18th-century Lukavec fort, the oldest structure in Turopolje, which is being reconstructed with €500,000 from the EU Solidarity Fund.

Bacic said he informed Velika Gorica Mayor Kresimir Ackar about amendments to the Reconstruction Act and plans to provide, by November, alternative accommodation for people currently staying in container homes, including through the construction of replacement homes.

The minister said that the reconstruction plan is realistic, stressing however that unresolved property-rights relations were one of the main obstacles to a faster reconstruction of family houses, and that the amendments to the current law, on which the parliament will vote on Friday, were designed to include in the reconstruction process also houses with incomplete ownership documentation.

Bacic noted that efforts would be made to launch structural reconstruction on most of the 27 houses in the area of Velika Gorica requiring such work.

He repeated that the government was not satisfied with the reconstruction of family houses but that major work was underway on the public infrastructure and public buildings, noting that his ministry would try and secure additional staff to process applications for housing reconstruction as the existing staff was insufficient considering the large number of applications.

Later in the day, Bacic is expected to visit construction sites in Zagreb with Mayor Tomislav Tomasevic.