Before the first meeting of Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic's new cabinet on Monday, handovers took place in the ministries assigned to the Domovinski pokret (DP) party and in the ministries where there was a change in leadership.

The new government will have 18 ministries instead of the previous 16, three of which have been allocated to the HDZ’s coalition partner, the DP.

The former Minister of Tourism and Sport, Nikolina Brnjac, handed over the ministry to Tonci Glavina, the only new HDZ official to head a ministry.

Glavina thanked Brnjac for the co-operation and the significant results achieved during her tem and said he would ensure the continuity of co-operation and good results.

The newly established Ministry of Environmental Protection and Green Transition

Brnjac recalled that she took over the Ministry at the worst possible time, namely during the pandemic and travel restrictions, when it was necessary to negotiate with source markets due to border closures and at the same time decide on a reform of the tourism sector.

Marija Vuckovic handed over the Ministry of Agriculture to Josip Dabro from the DP and took over the newly established Ministry of Environmental Protection and Green Transition, a department that was part of the former Ministry of Economy and Sustainable Development.

We have already cooperated with many areas of this ministry, and I would especially like to emphasise the cooperation with the departments that will be transferred to the new Ministry of Economy, said Vuckovic.

The ministry that Dabro heads is called the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry.

The former Minister of Economy and Sustainable Development, Damir Habijan, handed over the environmental protection part of the ministry to Vuckovic. The new Minister of Economy is Ante Susnjara from the DP.

New Minister of Justice: The first step is to centralise the currently scattered digitalisation process

Habijan has taken over the Ministry of Justice from Ivan Malenica, who will continue his career as a member of parliament.

Habijan thanked Malenica for his fight against corruption and said it had been an enormous task as around 100 laws had been implemented. He announced that his first step as Minister of Justice and Digital Transformation will be to centralise the currently scattered digitalisation process.

“Digitalisation will have four pillars – the first relates to the digitalisation of the economic sector, the second to administration, the third to working under digital conditions and the fourth to expanding the network,” Habijan said.

He emphasised that he would focus on the part of the judiciary that is most criticised by the public and the media – the slowness of court proceedings.

The former State Secretary for Demography, Zeljka Josic, introduced the new Minister Ivan Sipic from the DP in the newly created Ministry of Demography and Immigration.

Sipic said that demography is crucial for the Croatian people. “The main problem is how to get our people to stay, but also to survive.”