Bandic will head his independent slate in Constituency No. 1, which covers the northwestern part of Zagreb County and parts of downtown and western Zagreb. Jelena Pavicic Vukicevic will head the slate in Constituency No. 2, Miodrag Demo in Constituency No. 6 and Slavko Kojic in Constituency No. 7.

Asked why he was not running in Constituency No. 11, the one for the diaspora, in which he won a high number of votes at the last presidential election, Bandic said he knew the policy in Bosnia and Herzegovina well and that, more important than one or two more seats in parliament was reaching a consensus on the best politicians in Bosnia so that its Croat people could survive.

Bandic said he would spend HRK 2 million in the campaign.

He said he could not sit and do nothing, enjoying his position as the mayor of Zagreb while the country was faced with three crises - of work, unity and morality.

Bandic said 95 per cent of all election platforms were identical and that no politician was willing to tell the truth before the election - that painful cuts lay ahead.

He voiced confidence that Croatian citizens would support both accession to the European Union and painful cuts, but on the principle of solidarity and social justice. Apart from those two, he said success depended on competence in programme implementation, hard work, and responsibility.

Bandic proposed 10 key economic platform points, including urgently ridding the state and local self-government of bureaucracy, preventing corruption, radically changing the fiscal policy, extensive use of public-private partnership at all levels, reducing unemployment, and higher living standards for workers and pensioners.

Bandic's independent slate today submitted to the State Election Commission its lists of candidates for constituencies nos. 1, 2, 6 and 7. Bandic said the slate would get as many seats as was necessary for a better Croatia.