President Zoran Milanovic said on Sunday the Constitutional Court's Warning to him not to participate in the electoral process meant nothing in his "emotional and political world" and that if the court dared to annul the 17 April parliamentary election, it would be a coup.

He called on Prime Minister Andrej Plenković to come to Plitvice at least once to mark the anniversary of Operation Plitvice action and the death of policeman Josip Jović, the first victim of the Homeland War.

Speaking to the press at Plitvice Lakes, Milanovic reiterated that the Constitutional Court’s Warning did not apply to him because it was not a decision.

“I will give it the same attention as the prime minister gave to the facts he received from SOA (Security and Intelligence Agency) about the Turudic-Mamic socialising. The prime minister got that from me, and he completely ignored the facts. This is an unconstitutional fabrication,” Milanovic said about the Warning.

“We have a prime minister to whom, when he receives a report from the service where Croatian patriots work, about the character and deeds of Mr. Turudic, it means absolutely nothing… Turudic was under surveillance in a serious offense,” he said about judge Ivan Turudic, who has been appointed state attorney general.

The Constitutional Court can bring great disorder and “do what Plenković has been doing for years, which is gaslighting,” the president said.

“This is a well-trodden path to the mental collapse of Croatian society. But we will change that because the Rivers of justice are coming,” he added, referring to a Social Democratic Party-led coalition.

Milanovic said he was the author of the election platform and that he fully stood behind it. “The average pension will be 50 percent of the average salary, and with that, something can be bought,” he said, adding that he had initiated tax reforms when he served as prime minister.

The Constitutional Court put DIP in a “comical and politically impossible situation”

On Saturday, Milanovic said the State Electoral Commission (DIP) could not give him, as president, instructions regarding election campaigning and that the Constitutional Court brought DIP into a ”comical and politically impossible situation”.

Milanovic said that in Sisak where he watched the final match of the Croatian ice hockey championship.

Earlier in the afternoon, DIP announced that it would monitor everything happening in the media sphere and that there were clear electoral rules that applied to everyone.

“In a broader context, an electoral participant can be anyone who, from their position, calls for voting or not voting for a political camp. Any call outside the constitution and the law can be interpreted as interference in regular electoral campaigning,” DIP vice president Josip Salapić said when asked if Milanovic was an electoral participant.

“I don’t know what will happen to you, the media, when you report some news. Will they revoke your license? They won’t, just as they won’t annul the election, except in the case of electoral fraud, which will certainly not be committed by either the SDP or the Homeland Movement, but possibly by the HDZ if they are allowed,” Milanovic said, adding that DIP cannot issue instructions to him nor do they apply to him.

Milanović once again referred to the Constitutional Court’s Warning of 18 March, saying it is solely in the service of protecting Plenković.

“He is being protected from having to face me because, in that confrontation, he has no chance. The media will not broadcast our confrontation because he has an excuse. It’s all an agreement between the HDZ and the HDZ, i.e., the Constitutional Court,” he said.

The president assessed that a very dangerous thing was being done to Croatian citizens, resulting in a loss of freedom, pride, and civic honour.

“This is systemic gaslighting in which the truth is a lie, and a lie is the truth. Lies are shamelessly told. We didn’t have that in Croatia even during the war, during (former president Franjo) Tuđman’s time… It wasn’t like this, it was more civilised… This is a disintegration of all criteria brought by AP.”

He accused Plenković and his associates of attempting to stifle freedom of speech in a democratic society and said that in the parliamentary election, citizens would choose between two options.

“People will… vote on whether they want the country to continue to be run by people who have completely disgraced it and brought it to the brink of madness or if it should be me, but not like Plenković. I don’t want such usurping power nor will I ever have it. I never abused power, and that is a serious guarantee to people about how I will behave.”

Milanovic said he decided to come to Sisak to see what had been done for that city in the past seven and a half years.

“Nothing has been done. When I become prime minister, the city will receive the treatment it deserves. And not because the mayor is from the SDP, but it is because she is from the SDP that the city is receiving such treatment.”

One of the future steps, if he becomes the new prime minister, will be to ban the lease of advertising space in the media for state-owned companies.

“That’s the worst kind of racketeering,” he said, adding that in the HEP power company, they have a debt of over a billion euros due to the subsidy for electricity that the government gave, which is very good, but HEP must pay for it.”

Regarding Sunday’s commemoration at Plitvice Lakes, he said Interior Minister Davor Božinović “organised it as a private party. That event is of national importance, and key people were not invited. I’m going there on my own.”