Hasanbegović: Osobo Borić, no pasaran!

The Development Strategy of the City of Zagreb for the period until 2020, proposed by Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandić, was accepted on Thursday by a majority vote (26 for and 19 against) at the City Assembly session, and the discussion on this point was marked by a verbal confrontation between the ‘extreme right’ and ‘radical left’ regarding whether the better term is ‘gender and sexual’ or just ‘sexual’ equality.

Rada Borić (Nova ljevica) warned that Bandić proposed amendments to the strategy proposal at ‘five to twelve’, removing gender equality from it. In a written explanation for why he removed the term ‘gender’, Mayor Bandić, who did not attend the discussion, stated that it was about ‘terminological alignment of terms with the Constitution and the Gender Equality Act’. Borić, on the other hand, believes that it is about Bandić’s appeasement of the radical right, which is campaigning against the term ‘gender’.

Hasanbegović: Osobo Borić, no pasaran! Borić: tomorrow national minorities will disappear

“This is an attempt to penetrate gender ideology into a strategic document, and such ideological colonization will not pass in any form,” responded Zlatko Hasanbegović from the Independents for Croatia, sending a message to Rada Borić, “osobo Borić, no pasaran!” Borić replied and emphasized that it is evident that Bandić is being blackmailed again.

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“It is concerning that something is being attempted to be smuggled in overnight. Tomorrow, national minorities will also disappear from documents. If you are already returning us to feudalism, do not take us back to the Middle Ages,” stated Borić, reminding that the term gender was used in strategies and action plans in previous years.

Tomislav Tomašević from Zagreb is ours! ironically told Hasanbegović that he is glad that he (Hasanbegović) knows how to discuss something that is not street signs.

“The mayor is not here now, but it doesn’t matter because there is another mayor here,” said Tomašević, alluding to Hasanbegović’s position within the coalition with Bandić. He stated that “it is clear that it is about Bandić’s favoritism towards the Independents for Croatia. I am interested in the stance of the HDZ, which adopted the National Strategy for the Protection against Domestic Violence for the period from 2017 to 2020 in which terms like gender ideology are used.

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Tomašević also posed the question – “how can this pass at the national level, but not at the local level?”.

Bruna Esih from the Independents for Croatia party emphasized that they, as a party, are ready to take responsibility for removing the word ‘gender’ from the City Development Strategy.

The hours-long discussion on this point was interrupted due to a lack of quorum, as the representatives left the hall.

Mikulić welcomed the adoption of the strategy, some representatives are unserious

The President of the City Assembly, Andrija Mikulić (HDZ), stated to reporters that he welcomes the adoption of the strategy. He asserted that he is surprised by the ignorance of some representatives regarding certain issues, and that “it is obvious that they understand that the podium is a place where they should say something to promote themselves.”

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When asked to comment on the changes in the strategy regarding gender, he said that “of course, in every document we can find something that is missing. We will be for the adoption and welcome every time strategic documents are adopted. The strategy is a serious high level, after which ‘implementation programs’ will follow through which something will be done.”

Regarding the lack of quorum and the interruption of the session, he said he regrets that some city representatives took this unseriously.

“Someone has given you trust and you are paid with taxpayers’ money, and you leave the session and break the quorum. There are a number of representatives who are arguing on various social media and portals and lecturing other representatives. Instead of using the compensation they receive for the session in another parliament and discussing there, they are arguing on various pages. It would be normal for them to do it argumentatively, to check before they publish something,” stated the President of the City Assembly.

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“This is a place where discussions take place, and they behave like a little child when you give them and then take away the chocolate. Interestingly, they did not return or renounce the compensation they receive,” said Mikulić.

Hasanbegović told reporters during the break of the City Assembly session that “it has been proposed, at the suggestion of the mayor, to exclude certain parts that existed in the working material from the development strategy,” which, in his political opinion, as well as in the opinion of the assembly majority, is the imposition of the so-called gender ideology.

He stated that it is a series of “meaningless, actually ideological clichés, about promoting gender-sensitive language not only in the acts of the City Assembly and City Administration, but also in public speech.”

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“Thus, it is about a well-known ideological arsenal that is being attempted to be imposed in a specific act of the city of Zagreb, namely, the development strategy, through a roundabout way before it has succeeded in national legislation, including the discussion that we are yet to have on the ratification of the Istanbul Convention. There is no reason for that. In that sense, this mayor’s initiative went and it will be accepted by the assembly majority in the continuation of the session,” emphasized Hasanbegović.

Borić: The removal of gender is a direct threat to human rights

Rada Borić, when asked by reporters about the demonstrative leaving of the session, said that at the last session, when the opposition was speaking regarding the renaming of Marshal Tito Square to the Republic of Croatia Square, part of the position, namely “Mr. Hasanbegović and his, I could say, entourage, went outside, not knowing that they had thereby broken the quorum, and they returned in time.”

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“Then we just used their tactic. We think we do not have to listen to them since today was a very important day and as someone said, the whole day should have been dedicated to the Development Strategy of the City of Zagreb, because it deserves it, because we as citizens deserve it. We must deal with blackmail again since that amendment or already almost written decision came to us as representatives yesterday morning, and that decision was written in a language from which it was recognized who could propose it,” emphasized Borić.

“Thus, the removal of gender. Tomorrow, all other minorities will be erased. Thus, this is directly, to use their language, a threat to human rights,” concluded Borić.