Defence committee chair: Defence Minister has to leave

NEWS 20.01.202219:05 0 komentara
Slavko Midzor/PIXSELL, Ilustracija

The chairman of the parliamentary Defence Committee, Franko Vidovic (Social Democrats), said on Thursday that Defence Minister Mario Banozic should step down as he could not communicate with President Zoran Milanovic, which was detrimental to the defence system.

“The President’s letter to the Prime Minister says that the Armed Forces Chief-of-Staff did not break the law. Under the law, the minister communicates with the army through decisions, while the president, who is the army’s supreme commander, communicates through orders. If orders are in line with the law, they are not questioned but obeyed. I did not see any breach by the Armed Forces Chief-of-Staff, I think that he performed his task professionally,” Vidovic told reporters in the parliament.

Vidovic went on to say that he considered the minister’s publicly implying that the army’s chief-of-staff had acted unlawfully a big mistake, stressing that the defence system was based on consensus and agreement between the relevant stakeholders – the president of the state, the prime minister, the defence minister and a part of the military structure.

“If no agreement is possible, then the weak link… should realise that and leave. In this case, that is Defence Minister Mario Banozic because the President of the Republic is elected directly by voters and is the highest in the hierarchy. If you cannot maintain communication with the President of the Republic as the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, you should leave, and they both have admitted that they cannot communicate,” Vidovic said.

As for the minister and the president wrangling over declassification of the findings of an inspection into Admiral Hranj’s work and President Milanovic’s travels, Vidovic said that there was no reason why both documents could not be declassified.

“I do not want to be an arbiter. It is time to restore order because there are a number of requests for promotion to a higher rank waiting on the president’s desk because the minister is unable to communicate with him. It is having a direct impact on the Armed Forces,” he said.

Kakvo je tvoje mišljenje o ovome?

Budi prvi koji će ostaviti komentar!