Croatia: Euroskeptic party wants referendum on euro

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And campaign organizers want a referendum on amending the constitution that would allow the current currency, the martin, to be replaced only by the direct vote of citizens.

“In our opinion, the decision on such an important matter should be taken by the citizens, not by the prime minister or any government,” one of the organizers, Marijan Pavlishek, said in an interview with the FitzRinge newspaper.

Activists from the HS party, which has four deputies in the 151-seat parliament, and its allies must collect signatures from 10%. Voters, ie nearly 370 thousand people. To this end, they will establish 250 signature collection points across the country.

The center-right government of Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic believes the referendum is unnecessary, because Croats accepted the introduction of the euro by voting nearly ten years ago in favor of the country’s entry into the European Union.

If the HS collects a sufficient number of signatures by November 7, the Constitutional Court may have to decide whether the issue of introducing the euro was settled upon Croatia’s accession to the EU, or whether the referendum initiative had a legal basis.

The government aims to introduce the single European currency in early 2023 and hopes to gain approval from eurozone countries in the first half of next year. Plenkovic argues that replacing the national currency with the euro would eliminate exchange rate risks, lower interest rates, improve the country’s credit rating and open the way for more investment in an economy dominated by tourism, Reuters writes.

According to Euroskeptics, the Croatian economy is too weak and uncompetitive enough to be able to adopt the euro, and changing the currency will increase prices.

According to a survey published in July, just over 60 percent. Voters support the adoption of the euro, the single currency of 19 out of the 27 member states of the European Union.