PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE BUDISA TALKS TO ROCK MUSICIANS, STUDENTS

ZAGREB, Feb 1 (Hina) - The presidential candidate of the social democratic and liberal coalition which won recent parliamentary elections on Tuesday held talks in Zagreb with Croatian rock musicians, and briefly spoke to students after lunching in a student restaurant. Drazen Budisa told Croatia's rock musicians he would advocate that young people be given possibilities of better presentation in public, especially on Croatian Television. Also present at the talks was new Culture Minister Antun Vujic. After talking to the students, Budisa told reporters the students were primarily concerned with possibilities of employment following graduation. The new authorities will either pass or fail on this issue, he said, adding he was sure the new government would succeed in ensuring prospects for the young, and that soon there would be new jobs. Asked to comment on today's statement by the City Committee of the Social Democratic Action of Croatia (ASH) that "the possibility of Drazen Budisa's victory bodes for a renewed model of HDZ rule," Budisa said he was not familiar with the statement, and that if true it was absurd, with no rational political foundation. ASH is one of the parties supporting presidential counter-candidate Stipe Mesic. Budisa said his electoral programme was identical to Mesic's, stressing it was the programme which abolished the rule of the HDZ (Croatian Democratic Union). "I have already signed that programme, Stipe Mesic promised he would also sign it, and we both side with those parties which formed the (new) government," he said. Asked to comment on Mesic's invitation that he disclose the sources which financed his 1992 presidential campaign, Budisa said that in 1992 he did not have money for even one billboard, and that he was plagued by a lack of funds in all of his party campaigns in the last decade. He called on Mesic to say who financed all of his campaigns, including those when he was a member of the HDZ. (hina) ha