Biography
Ivo Josipović (pronounced [ǐːʋo josǐːpoʋitɕ]; born 28 August 1957) is a Croatian academic, jurist, composer, and politician who served as the president of Croatia from 2010 to 2015. Josipović entered politics as a member of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia (SKJ), and played a key role in the democratic transformation of the League of Communists of Croatia (SKH) into the Social Democratic Party (SDP) as the author of its first statute. He left politics in 1994, but returned in 2003, winning a seat in the Croatian Parliament running as an independent candidate on the SDP party list. He won re-election to parliament as a member of the SDP in 2007. In addition to politics, Josipović has also worked as a university professor, legal expert, musician and composer, and holds a Ph.D. in Law and advanced degrees in music composition.
Following the end of his first term in Parliament in January 2008, he ran in the 2009–10 presidential election as the candidate of the Social Democratic Party of Croatia (SDP), which he had rejoined in January 2008. In the first round he topped eleven rivals with 32.4% of the vote, and entered the run-off with independent conservative populist candidate and Mayor of Zagreb, Milan Bandić, who had secured 14.8%. He won the election with 60.26% of the vote in the second round of the election.
His campaign was titled "Nova pravednost" (New Justice), calling for a new legal framework to address deep social injustice, corruption and organised crime. This included protection of individual rights and promotion of fundamental values such as equality, human rights, LGBT rights, justice, diligence, social empathy and creativity. Josipović was inaugurated on 18 February 2010, at St. Mark's Square in Zagreb. His term officially began at midnight on 19 February.
Josipović sought reelection in the 2014–15 presidential election held on 28 December 2014. He was supported by the centre-left four-party Kukuriku coalition, led by the SDP. Josipović won 38.46% of the vote in the first round, finishing narrowly ahead of conservative HDZ candidate Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović. They entered a run-off, which took place on 11 January 2015 and which Josipović ultimately lost by a slim margin of around 32,500 votes, winning 49.3% of the vote to Grabar-Kitarović's 50.7%. He is the first President of Croatia not to be reelected to a second term.
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