Mrvica, a sailor and university professor, was a long-standing coordinator for ferry and shipping services in Dalmatia of the state-owned Jadrolinija company.
He worked in the Port of Split for 27 years and was and media appreciated very much his reports and the way he provided information about a state of affairs in transport by sea. He retired last year.
Apart from Mrvica, other candidates for the Communicator of the Year were Science and Education Minister Blazenka Divjak, European Parliament member Biljana Borzan of the Social Democratic Party, Colonel Davor Turkovic, and authors of the Facebook profile "Di su pare" (Where's the money).
On 20 February, the HUOJ named Sisak Bishop Vlado Kosic Anti-Communicator of the Year for 2017, saying that Kosic spread intolerance and used hate speech against specific political and social groups in the country.