Croatian Deputy Prime Minister Josip Dabro, a prominent figure in a nationalist hard-right party, has stepped down after a video emerged showing him firing shots at random from a moving vehicle.
This incident adds to the challenges facing the cabinet of conservative Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic, whose health minister, Vili Bros, was terminated in November amid a corruption investigation.
“I hereby submit my irrevocable resignation,” Mr. Dabro announced on Facebook.
The 42-year-old also held the position of agriculture minister in Mr. Plenkovic’s administration.
Lights in the background seem to indicate a populated area.
“I recognize that these circumstances place an additional burden on the government and my party,” he stated in his resignation letter.
“My personal circumstances should not divert the government and the ministry from their priorities or impede essential reforms.”
He expressed that he aimed to implement “changes” within the agriculture, forestry, and fisheries ministry to foster greater “transparency” and that he had faced “significant pressures and threats”.
In his initial public response to the video last night, Mr. Dabro claimed it had been recorded several years prior and that he was using training ammunition, according to Hina news agency.
The footage appears to have been taken during the summer.
The government responded last night, declaring his actions as “inappropriate and irresponsible”.
Mr. Plenkovic’s HDZ party formed a coalition government in May 2024 alongside Dabro’s Homeland Movement, which espouses nationalist, anti-immigration, and anti-LGBT beliefs, and advocates for the prohibition of abortion.
The leader of the Homeland Movement, Ivan Penava, asserted that the coalition remains “stable”.
During a news conference, he remarked that the video “was private and was shared with individuals whom Mr. Dabro believed were his friends … At no point did he endanger anyone’s life”.
