Croats were voting to elect a new president on Sunday in a race that incumbent Zoran Milanovic, a critic of the European Union and NATO aid to Ukraine, is leading in the polls.
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Croatia’s President Zoran Milanovic. File Image- Reuters
Croatia’s outspoken President Zoran Milanovic won Sunday’s election in the first round, according to an exit poll. He received more than 50 percent of the vote.
Around 3.8 million Croats are eligible to vote for one of eight candidates, three of whom are women, ranging from the left to the right of the political spectrum. The post of president is mostly ceremonial.
Milanovic, the opposition Socialist Democrats’ candidate, is running for a second term. His main challenger is Dragan Primorac, a former science minister backed by the governing Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ).
Milanovic, backed by the opposition left-wing Social Democrats, won 51.48 percent of the vote while Dragan Primorac, the candidate of the ruling conservative HDZ party, came second with 19.29 percent, showed the exit poll released by the state-run HRT television immediately after polling stations closed.
The election comes as the European Union and NATO member country of 3.8 million people struggles with biting inflation, widespread corruption and a labour shortage.
Although Milanovic was considered the strong favourite, surveys suggested that none of the candidates would garner more than 50 percent of the vote needed to win outright and avoid a runoff in two weeks.
If the official results, due later on Sunday, confirm Milanovic’