Leader in the New White Paper – Family Project Plenković for Disciplining Unwanted Media

Leader has recently been highlighted in public as one of the six newspaper publications that are the fiercest critics of the Government. This is one of the few accurate conclusions of the pamphlet that, under the guise of a supposed scientific work and titled 'Communication Interpretation of Media Content in Croatian Print Media about the Government of the Republic of Croatia', was published in his journal Media, Culture and Public Relations by retired communication expert Mario Plenković, the father of Prime Minister Andrej Plenković.

Thirty-eight years ago, the so-called white paper was published, in which the faction of the League of Communists of Croatia led by Stipe Šuvar dealt with unwanted intellectuals, writers, journalists, and everyone who did not fit into Šuvar’s rigid political discourse. Plenković senior produced – as co-author, editor-in-chief, and publisher – a pale copy of the ‘white paper’, in which he dealt with everyone who dared to criticize the Government and especially his son who is at its head.

Who is Mario Plenković

A former professor at the Faculty of Political Science in Zagreb, who left ‘by mutual agreement’ under unexplained circumstances at the end of 1998, has never been politically exposed. However, without an excellent rating in the highest party circles, he could not have become a systemic ‘man of trust’ – director of FPZ and one of the founders of the journalism study. However, in 1990, everything changed, and Plenković senior quickly became the deputy president of the Executive Council of the newly established Free Weekly of Marinko Božić. In the meantime, he lived and worked in Maribor and stated that he refuses to speak to the media because he ‘agreed with Andrej’:

– While he is Prime Minister, I do not enter into political commentary. Next year I will leave everything and dedicate myself to my grandchildren – he said at the end of 2019 for Večernji list, but he nevertheless returned to the political scene.

He placed a number of publications under his ‘scientific’ magnifying glass. He did not differentiate between daily newspapers, weeklies, monthlies, and occasional publications. He also took into account the annual report of The Economist for Croatia, publications for retirees, builders, and hunters, HEP’s bulletin, School Newspapers, the newsletter of St. Anthony of Padua…

Almost all daily newspapers (except one tabloid) entered the regime category. This is not surprising, as these publications extensively report on the work of the Government, thus having a large number of neutral texts, unlike weeklies that report significantly less and analyze and comment more. Likewise, ‘in the game’ were national newspapers, as well as regional and local ones, which deal more with communal problems than the work of the Government, which is mentioned only in passing.

Leader Represents Entrepreneurs

Thus, as the fiercest critics, Plenković senior singled out Hrvatski tjednik, Novosti, 24 Express, Nacional, 7 dnevno, and – Leader, qualifying them as ‘extremely negative media content’. In conclusion, he emphasized ‘the emergence of extremely irrationally negative print media content that is not in accordance with the laws of logical argumentation and structural laws of print media expressive ethical journalistic and communication standards regarding the program, work, activities, and reputation of the Government of the Republic of Croatia’. Unfortunately, we do not know what his measure for logical argumentation is.

As for Leader, and this journalist, who was named in the ‘scientific work’, we will continue to criticize, but as before – rationally. We will continue to represent our readers, entrepreneurs. We will point out the actions of the Government that do not contribute to entrepreneurship, and we will continue to be subjective in that regard.

Leader will continue to criticize this government, as well as previous ones: for an expensive and inefficient state that does not share the fate of the real sector; for an unambitious policy that is satisfied with growth of less than three percent; for postponing any serious reform; for dramatic lagging behind other transitional European countries; for long-term favoritism towards importers; for neglecting production, especially commodity exports; for the ‘Dutch disease’, i.e., increasing dependence on insecure tourism; for the lack of a real strategy (the document that is so named is merely a completed homework for withdrawing money from the EU)…

The mess of Plenković senior and his associates, whose only goal was to discipline the media, would not deserve a reaction if it were an isolated case of an unemployed emeritus (who received this honor despite the opposition of the home FPZ). The problem is that the apple has not fallen far from the tree. It does not matter whether Prime Minister Plenković personally ordered such research from communication expert Plenković (which I do not believe), whether the new ‘white paper’ is the result of a casual son’s remark at a family lunch, or a self-initiated paternal help to a son in trouble.

Stopping Reuters

In any case, the Prime Minister not only did not distance himself from his father’s pamphlet, but he is also extremely dissatisfied with his image in the media. Recently, he showed a high degree of nervousness when he spoke to journalists about the great victory of HDZ in the local elections. He also blamed them for the defeat of the Zagreb candidate because they ‘deliberately’ mispronounced his name.

However, the political anonymous – who was supposed to be just a sparring partner for the real HDZ candidate Milanu Bandiću – was misnamed by his party colleagues as well. However, only journalists, primarily from RTL television and Nova TV, received Plenković’s portion, and he also targeted N1 television (which also bothers his father). This news channel, what a coincidence, has just been removed from the package of a cable operator.

To make matters more paradoxical, one of the two most arrogant politicians accuses – journalists of arrogance. Who knows, maybe dad is already investigating ‘extremely negative television content’. He has already promised to continue calling out printed media, and he could finally deal with portals. Thus, he would complete the quasi-state family project of ‘stopping Reuters’, i.e., disciplining unwanted media.

{embed_digitalno_izdanje}{/embed_digitalno_izdanje}