Božo Petrov
Božo Petrov is a Croatian politician and psychiatrist who served as the 11th Speaker of the Croatian Parliament since independence and the 21st Speaker overall, from 2016 to 2017. He previously served as mayor of Metković from 2013 to 2016, and Deputy Prime Minister in the Cabinet of Tihomir Orešković from January until his election as the Speaker in October 2016. Since 2012 he has been leader of the Bridge of Independent Lists party. Petrov resigned his position as the Speaker on 4 May 2017, amidst a government and parliamentary crisis. Having held the office for a little over six months, Petrov is to date the shortest serving Speaker of the Parliament since 1991.
Early life and family
Petrov was born in Metković to locksmith Jakov, and Marija Petrov, a bookkeeper. He has an elder sister, Nikolina, and two younger brothers, Branimir and Ivan. Petrov attended elementary school in his hometown and high school in Sinj. At the age of 14 he decided to join the Franciscan order, but eventually changed his mind.Petrov graduated from the Medical Faculty of the University of Mostar in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and specialized psychiatry in the Psychiatric Hospital Vrapče in Zagreb, after which he worked as a psychiatrist at the University Clinical Hospital in Mostar.
He is married to Maša Petrov, a primary school teacher with whom he has three sons: Jakov, Dominik and Andrija.
Political career
Petrov began his political career as an independent candidate in the 2011 parliamentary election on the list of the conservative Croatian Growth party. He eventually ended his collaboration with Hrast because "they betrayed its members and sided with the HDZ", which he did not approve.On 17 November 2012, Petrov and other local politicians and activists life founded the Bridge of Independent Lists as a regionalist political platform and was chosen as its first president.
In 2013, the Bridge of Independent Lists participated in the local elections in the town of Metković. The party won 46.25% of votes and 9 out of 17 seats in the City Council. Petrov won 45.78% of the votes and entered the second round of election for the mayor against Stipe Gabrić Jambo, incumbent mayor since 1997. In the second round Petrov won with 67.94% of the votes and became the mayor of his hometown. At the same election, Bridge of Independent Lists won 9.97% of the votes in county elections and entered the County Assembly of the Dubrovnik-Neretva County.
As mayor, Petrov cut his and the city councillors' wage to the minimum. Finding a city debt of HRK 17.6 million, he managed to bring it down by 6.4 million, or 36%. His deputies work as volunteers, while the councillors' fees amount to a symbolic 1 HRK. Petrov abolished also the compensation to the members of supervisory boards and management councils, and representation expenses decreased by 10 times and travel costs by 8 times. He also terminated several expensive public contracts, and introduced transparency in public spending. His work to sanitize the city's budget got him to be declared the best mayor in the region. After having halved the city debt, he increased the salaries of the city administration, but they remained 30% lower than they were at the time he took office as mayor.
2015 parliamentary election
For the 2015 parliamentary election, Petrov's Most party went national and was joined by independent local politicians from other parts of the country. Led by Petrov, the party campaigned for fiscal responsibility, reduction of government spending and public debt, tax cuts, reforms in the public sector and the reduction of administrative divisions in Croatia.Petrov's party turned out the surprise of the election, with 13.17% of the votes and 19 seats in the Croatian Parliament. The party had a crucial role in forming the new government and started negotiations with the ruling centre-left Croatia is Growing coalition, centred around the Social Democratic Party, and the opposition centre-right Patriotic Coalition, centred around the Croatian Democratic Union. Members of the party said that they won’t join any of the two coalitions in forming the new government unless their reform agenda is adopted. After more than 40 days of negotiations and numerous twists, Most decided to give its support to a government led by the HDZ, giving them a slim majority of 78 seats. They nominated the Croatian Canadian businessman Tihomir Orešković to be the next Prime Minister.
Deputy Prime Minister (2016)
The new government was approved by the Sabor on 22 January 2016. Petrov was named Deputy Prime Minister. Along with Petrov, six ministers in the government were nominated by Most.In February, the Most party prepared amendments for reducing benefits of members of the parliament, but the bill was stopped and did not reach voting in the Sabor. The party accused HDZ and SDP for blocking the bill.
In March, Petrov and his party announced amendments to the law regulating the rights of former presidents of Croatia that would rescind the Office of the Former President. This move revoked the entitlements of former president Stjepan Mesić, who criticised the move, and saved around 600,000 HRK to the government budget. In the same month, Petrov started negotiations with labour union representatives over a 6 percent wage increase for public sector workers, as GDP grew over 2% for two consecutive quarters. The wage rise was signed in 2009 by the Government of Ivo Sanader with labour unions. The government had not planned funds for the wage increase in the 2016 budget and wanted to negotiate new terms of the contract, as there was no money for its implementation.
Relations between Most and the Patriotic Coalition have long been strained and continued to deteriorate in May. Members of HDZ started talking about reshuffling the government. After it was revealed that the wife of Tomislav Karamarko had business with the consultant of Hungarian oil company MOL, Petrov and his party called for Karamarko to resign due to political responsibility. A vote of no confidence was started by SDP in the Sabor, which was backed by ministers and MPs from the Most party. After Karamarko refused to step down, Petrov said that he and ministers from his party are ready to resign if Karamarko remained in the government, adding that "an individual should never be above the state". On 3 June, in an attempt at a compromise solution, Prime Minister Tihomir Orešković called on Petrov and Karamarko to resign for the sake of stability of the country. Orešković said that their relations have become a burden for the government. Petrov responded that he is ready to step down if it will help stabilise the situation in the country, while Karamarko refused to resign and stressed out that Orešković no longer has the support of HDZ. A vote of no confidence in the Prime Minister was initiated by HDZ. Petrov's party continued to support Orešković and asked for the resignation of Karamarko. On 16 June the confidence vote took place in the Parliament that resulted in the fall of Orešković's government by a vote of 125 MPs in favour, 15 against and 2 abstentions. Both HDZ and most of the opposition voted in favour, while the Bridge of Independent Lists voted against.