Opposition MPs said that Friday's thematic session of the parliamentary Judiciary Committee turned into a show staged by the ruling HDZ party to cover up the investigation. They expressed their dissatisfaction that State Attorney-General Ivan Turudic did not answer any of their questions.

Judiciary Committee Chairman Nikola Grmoja (Most party), said that the ruling majority obviously wanted to prevent the committee from receiving information.

“It was not me who made the show, I just wanted the questions to be answered, they staged the show, the ruling majority called the session (of the Judiciary Committee) for 10 am today, and you saw how they behaved,” he said. HDZ MPs and Hrvoje Zekanovic (HDS party) kept interrupting the debate, and the Attorney-General practically attacked the opposition and did not answer questions,” Grmoja said.

“The public could see that their goal was for the committee not to receive information, and the Attorney- General came when they agreed with him and left an hour later,” Grmoja said.

He added that he managed to ask Turudic a specific question, namely whether the preliminary investigation into the case of the mayor of Otok, Josip Saric, had taken too long, to which Turudic replied in the affirmative.

Conflict within the HDZ

“This confirms our suspicion that this is a conflict within the HDZ,” said Grmoja.

SDP party MP Misel Jaksic said that it was commendable that Attorney-General Turudic had come to Parliament on Friday, as it showed that he understood his role and respected Parliament, but that his decision to leave the committee meeting was reckless. Jaksic blamed both the members of the ruling majority and the committee chairman Grmoja.

Jaksic said that the discussion had moved completely away from the main topic and was characterised by the antics of MP Hrvoje Zekanovic, primitive hubris, shouting and trivialities. “It’s as if the script had been written by the HDZ,” he said.

Jaksic said that there is definitely a suspicion that information was leaked because the parliament was not supposed to vote last Friday (when the parliament confirmed Saric’s resignation), but it is difficult to prove anything at this stage.

It is not realistic to expect that the Attorney- General, regardless of what we think of him, will come here and say that he suspects an information leak, the SDP MP said.

The history of Croatian judiciary shows that information leaks are never proven and citizens will ultimately have to decide whether to trust Turudic or not, he said.

Sabotage of state institutions

“What we have witnessed is another sabotage of state institutions by the HDZ and the Attorney- General,” said MP Ivana Kekin (Mozemo party), criticising Turudic’s abrupt departure.

“He has not answered a single question, except that he said that he will not take any action. How is that possible when he said the other day that hundreds of people knew about the investigation and that something might have been leaked,” Kekin said, adding that the Mozemo party would request that the report on the work of the Attorney- General be put on the parliament’s agenda earlier than planned.

MP Dalija Oreskovic (DOSIP) said that Turudic was visibly nervous in the session because he said something he might not have wanted to say.

“Namely, that the investigation against Saric lasted 2 to 3 years and that a motion to waive his parliamentary immunity had already been prepared, so the Attorney- General obviously knew about this document,” she said, adding that Saric’s offer to resign before the motion to waive his immunity arrived in parliament meant that someone had tipped him off.

Not a single coherent answer

“This person is someone in a high position in the Office of Attorney-General. My first guess would be Ivan Turudic, considering his previous relations with the HDZ,” Oreskovic said, adding that Turudic could not be trusted as he had denied any information leaks.

MP Marijana Puljak (Centre) also expressed dissatisfaction with today’s meeting of the Judiciary Committee. In his speech to the committee, Turudic described the latest developments as “business as usual”. “He meant that it was a show for the public, but it was staged by the HDZ,” said Puljak.

“We all gathered because we have a reasonable suspicion that information has been leaked, but he sees nothing suspicious,” Puljak added.

The proposal to hold the thematic session of the Judiciary Committee on information leaks was made by committee chairman Nikola Grmoja after the arrest of two HDZ party members who had previously resigned – Josip Skoric, who resigned as chairman of the board of the motorway operator Hrvatske Ceste, and Josip Saric, who resigned as an MP.

Grmoja said there were reasonable grounds to suspect that information about the imminent arrests had been leaked to the suspects or, even worse, to the HDZ party leadership and the prime minister, who then demanded their resignation to prevent further damage to the party.