Andrej Plenkovic's government is preparing amendments to the Defence Act, the sole aim of which is to limit and reduce the constitutional powers of the President as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Republic of Croatia.

Zoran Milanovic has spoken out on this issue and issued a statement backed by the Constitution.

We reproduce his statement in full:

“The Government of Andrej Plenkovic is preparing amendments to the Defence Act whose sole aim is to limit and reduce the constitutional powers of the President of the Republic as the Commander-in-Chief of the Croatian Armed Forces. Therefore, before he tries to launch a further attack on the Croatian Constitution, I am warning Andrej Plenkovic of a fact that is written in the Constitution, in Article 100, which clearly and unequivocally states: The President of the Republic is Commander-in-Chief of the Croatian Armed Forces. No more or no less. The Constitution does not distinguish between the Commander-in-Chief in peace and the Commander-in-Chief in war.

Moreover, Article 94 of the Constitution stipulates that ‘the President of the Republic is responsible for the defense of the independence and territorial integrity of the Republic of Croatia’. Neither the Government nor the Prime Minister has this level of constitutional responsibility for defense, and certainly not the Minister of Defense. And any attempt – through the announced amendments to the Defense Act – to interpret Article 100 of the Constitution otherwise would signify an attempt to trample the Constitution, an attempt to amend the Constitution in an unconstitutional manner, and an attempt to steal the constitutional authority of the President of the Republic as Commander-in-Chief of the Croatian Armed Forces.

So, Andrej Plenkovic is once again planning to exceed the framework of the constitutional order. This time he thinks that by amending the Defense Act, he can, through his minister, take over command of the army. In fact, his intention is to bring the Croatian Army under his control, even though, according to the Constitution, the President of the Republic is Commander-in-Chief. This would not be a first for him, since he has already tried to take control of the Military Security and Intelligence Agency, which I thwarted.

Whether or not Plenkovic wants to impose his autocracy on the Croatian Army by amending the Defence Act or whether he wants to pave the way for sending the Croatian Army to Ukraine, it should be clear to him: as long as I am President of the Republic, I will be Commander-in-Chief of the Croatian Armed Forces, and the Croatian soldier will not fight other people’s wars. I call on Plenkovic to respect the Croatian Constitution and to respect the will of the Croatian people who have given me their trust precisely because I am protecting the Croatian Army from Plenkovic’s and other people’s wars,” Milanovic wrote in his statement.