Croatia: EPP member party HDZ wins first EU election; twofold failure for Socialist/Liberal government
Brussels, 15 April 2013
The President of the European People’s Party (EPP),Wilfried Martens, has congratulated the election victory of the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), a member party of the EPP. Yesterday's poll was the first European election that took place in Croatia, ahead of the country’s formal EU accession on 1 July 2013. The HDZ list scored nearly 33% of votes and 6 out of the 12 seats in the European Parliament. Voter turn out was a very low 20.76%.“I congratulate the HDZ and Tomislav Karamarko for winning the first European elections in Croatia. This is a well deserved victory and a recognition of HDZ’s instrumental role in securing Croatia’s membership in the European Union,” stated the EPP President.
“This result is also a twofold failure for the Socialist/Liberal government because not only did it lose the election but it also ran a very poor information campaign to promote it to the Croatian citizens, which resulted in the very low turn out. The government’s subpar performance is not the best kick-off for Croatia’s EU accession,” Martens added.
Note to editors:
The EPP is the largest and most influential European-level political party of the centre-right, which currently includes 73 member-parties from 40 countries, the Presidents of the European Commission and the European Council, 13 EU and 6 non-EU heads of state and government, 13 members of the European Commission and the largest Group in the European Parliament.
For more information:
Kostas Sasmatzoglou, EPP Spokesman, Tel. +32-2-2854147
Javier Jiménez, EPP Senior Press and Communication Officer, Tel. +32-475480446