HAZU President Sets Precedent by Announcing Future Leadership Slate

During a formal session of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts (HAZU), where new academicians were being inducted, President Velimir Neidhardt deviated from tradition. Instead of focusing solely on the academy's history and the continuous chain of excellence since 1866, Neidhardt used the platform to publicly endorse a complete slate of future leaders.

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On the festive session of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts, where new academicians were proclaimed, president Velimir Neidhardt spoke as academy presidents like to speak on such occasions: about tradition, identity, Strossmayer and the unbroken chain of excellence that has lasted since 1866.

He proposed Davor Miličić as the next president, with Dario Vretenar and Mladen Obad Šćitaroci as vice presidents, and Bojan Jerbić as the new secretary-general. This move, presenting a pre-selected leadership team at an event meant to honor new members, has been described as an institutional precedent.

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And then, in the same speech and from the same podium, he did something that can rightly be called an institutional precedent.

The academy's official elections for its new leadership are not scheduled until November, making Neidhardt's public endorsement of his preferred successors a notable and unusual step.

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He publicly proposed the entire future leadership of the Academy: Davor Miličić for president, Dario Vretenar and Mladen Obad Šćitaroci for vice presidents, and Bojan Jerbić for secretary-general.