Editing Franjo Tuđman (section)

==1990 election campaign==
{{Main|1990 Croatian parliamentary election}}
Internal tensions that had broken up the [[League of Communists of Yugoslavia]] prompted the governments of the federal republics to schedule free multiparty elections in spring 1990. These were the first free multi-party elections for the [[Croatian Parliament]] since 1913. The HDZ held its first convention on 24–25 February 1990, when Tuđman was elected its president. The election campaign took place from late March until 20 April 1990. Tuđman recruited several supporters from members of the diaspora who returned home, most importantly [[Gojko Šušak]].{{sfn|Tanner|2001|p=222}}

Tuđman based his campaign mostly on the national question. He stated that the [[Yugoslav dinar|dinar]] earned in Croatia should stay in Croatia, thus objecting to the subsidies for less developed parts of Yugoslavia, or for the Yugoslav army.{{sfn|Tanner|2001|p=223}} He addressed the economic crisis, called for the renewal of a market economy and a parliamentary democracy, and expressed his support for the accession to the [[European Community]]. He maintained that Yugoslavia could survive only as a confederation.{{sfn|Sadkovich|2008|p=180}} Although Tuđman had ties with the right-wing anti-Communist diaspora, he also had important colleagues from the Partisan Communist establishment, including [[Josip Boljkovac]] and [[Josip Manolić]].{{sfn|Tanner|2001|p=223}} His main opponent in the election was [[Ivica Račan]] from the [[League of Communists of Croatia]] (SKH), who became the SKH Chairman in December 1989.{{sfn|Tanner|2001|p=221}}

Tuđman's talk of Croatia's past glories and independence was not received well among Croatian Serbs. The HDZ was heavily criticized by Serbian media, portraying their possible victory as a revival of [[Independent State of Croatia|NDH]].{{sfn|Tanner|2001|p=224}} [[Veljko Kadijević]], general of the JNA, said at meeting of the army and SR Croatia leaderships that the elections would bring the [[Ustaše]] to power in Croatia. A few weeks before the elections, the army removed the weapons of the [[Territorial Defense (Yugoslavia)|Territorial Defence]] from stores all over Croatia.{{sfn|Tanner|2001|p=225}} During a HDZ campaign rally in [[Benkovac]], an ethnically mixed town, a 62-year-old Serbian man, Boško Čubrilović, pulled out a gas pistol near the podium. Croatian media described the incident as an assassination attempt on Tuđman, but Čubrilović was in late 1990 charged and convicted only of threatening the security staff. The incident further worsened ethnic tensions.{{sfn|Tanner|2001|p=227}}

During his campaign, on 16 April 1990 Tuđman had a conversation with news reporters where he said: {{blockquote|All sorts of other lies are being spread today, I do not know what else they will invent. I've heard that I'm of Jewish descent, but I found, I knew of my ancestors in Zagorje from around 350 years ago, and I said, maybe it would be good to have some of that, I guess I would be richer, I might not have become a Communist. Then, as if that's not enough, then they declare that my wife is Jewish or Serbian. Luckily for me, she never was either, although many wives are. And so on and so forth spreading lies&nbsp;...<ref name="Nazor-2013">{{cite web|publisher=Dnevno.hr|url=http://www.dnevno.hr/kolumne/ante-nazor/76778-laz-je-da-tudman-izbacio-srbe-iz-ustava.html|language=hr|title=Laž je da Tuđman 'izbacio' Srbe iz Ustava|trans-title=The lie is that Tuđman 'banned' Serbs from the Constitution|author=Ante Nazor|date=26 January 2013|access-date=16 May 2015|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141027054405/http://www.dnevno.hr/kolumne/ante-nazor/76778-laz-je-da-tudman-izbacio-srbe-iz-ustava.html|archive-date=27 October 2014}}</ref>}}

The part of the statement about his wife was later widely criticized, including by officials of the [[Simon Wiesenthal Center]].<ref name="nytschemo">{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/04/22/us/anger-greets-croatian-s-invitation-to-holocaust-museum-dedication.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm|title=Anger Greets Croatian's Invitation To Holocaust Museum Dedication|last=Schemo|first=Diana Jean|date=22 April 1993|work=[[The New York Times]]|access-date=14 June 2011}}</ref> Croatian historian Ante Nazor cited claims by Tuđman's son, [[Miroslav Tuđman|Miroslav]] and Stijepo Mijović Kočan {{Who|date=May 2015}} about the statement being directed against the former Yugoslav communist system rather than against Jews or Serbs; instead about mixed marriages being used by Croats as a means to promotion in the system.<ref name="Nazor-2013"/> On 19 April, at a rally in Zadar, Tuđman said:<ref>{{cite news|url=http://dogodilose.com/2015/04/19/preduzborni-skup-hdz-a-u-zadru-19-travnja|title=Predizborni skup HDZ-a u Zadru 19. travnja|access-date=6 February 2016}}</ref>{{blockquote|Let them not deceive that we want a restoration of the fascist NDH, which was created and disappeared within the Second World War. We know that the Croatian people also fought during the war on the other side under partisan, Tito's flags because he promised to create a free Federal State of Croatia that would be equal to all other nations. Clearly, instead of a realization of these ideals we received communist hell.}}

The elections were scheduled for all 356 seats in the parliament. Tuđman's party triumphed and got an absolute majority of around 60% or 205 seats in the Croatian Parliament. Tuđman was elected to the position of [[president of Croatia]] on {{awrap|30 May 1990}}. After the victory of HDZ the nationalistic [[Serb Democratic Party (Croatia)|Serb Democratic Party]] (SDS) spread its influence quickly in places where Serbs formed a high percentage of the population.{{sfn|Goldstein|1999|p=215}} Since the split among communists in Yugoslavia along ethnic lines was already a fact at that time, it seemed inevitable that the conflicts would continue following the multi-party elections which brought to power new political establishments in Croatia, [[Socialist Republic of Slovenia|Slovenia]] and [[Socialist Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina|Bosnia and Herzegovina]], while at the same time the same communist officials kept their posts in [[Socialist Republic of Serbia|Serbia]] and [[Socialist Republic of Montenegro|Montenegro]].{{citation needed|date=July 2015}}