KERAVICA DOES NOT WANT TO RUN FOR OFFICE OF VUKOVAR DEPUTY MAYOR

( Editorial: --> 7896 ) VUKOVAR, July 15 (Hina) - The Serb Democratic Independent Party (SDSS) vice president Miroslav Keravica on Wednesday said he decided not to run for the office of Vukovar deputy mayor. Keravica was proposed by the SDSS as a replacement for the incumbent deputy mayor Vaskrsije Vuksanovic, who is soon to move to Yugoslavia. The SDSS proposal was strongly opposed by the local Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) which accused Keravica of being a close associate of Slavko Dokmanovic and demanded that the Government appoint its commissioner for Vukovar. Keravica held the office of mayor during the occupation of Vukovar. The SDSS has not proposed another replacement. "If HDZ councillors in the town council don't want to support me as deputy mayor, there is no sense in my running for the office," Keravica told a press conference following today's session of the SDSS main committee. He added that he did not want the Croatian Government to appoint its commissioner because of him. The SDSS does not accept responsibility for the non-functioning of the town administration and it will not be guilty if the Government appoints a commissioner, SDSS president Vojislav Stanimirovic said adding that mayor Vladimir Stengl and HDZ were to blame for the current situation in the town. The SDSS still believes that another six Serbs should be employed with the town administration because that was agreed at the last meeting of high HDZ and SDSS officials in Zagreb, Stanimirovic said. HDZ president in Vukovar Petar Mlinaric recently said that the employment of another six Serbs was an SDSS demand, not an agreement. Mlinaric said his party would accept another three Serb employees at most. SDSS president Stanimirovic further said that the local elections, which are to be organised by a commissioner in six months at latest, could not be held because the exact number of voters was not known. Speaking about the general situation in the region, Stanimirovic said that about 400 families had left the region in the last two months. Those Serbs who are returning from the Danube region to other parts of Croatia can neither reclaim their houses nor are their houses being reconstructed, Stanimirovic concluded. (hina) rml 152104 MET jul 98