Family Courts and Schools: a Match Made in Hell?
If you think your child's teacher will help protect them, you may need to think again. Especially if corruption is involved.
This is the current Croatian Minister of Education, Radovan Fuchs. He is a scientist, and is said to be the wealthiest minister in Croatia. His wealth reportedly comes from real estate.
His political party, the Croatian Democratic Union, as an entity and a party, has been convicted of corruption. It has never been clear to me, or many others, how this party can still be operating, let alone governing an EU Member State.
One week ago his son and his son’s father in law were accused of fraud.
So it’s not a huge surprise that the Croatian Ministry of Education became embroiled in the kidnap of my children, British-Croatian citizens, by their Croatian father, aided and abetted by the Croatian state.
However, I am not the only one who is finding that schools are part of the family court problem. Many parents I have spoken with, in Croatia and elsewhere, have confirmed that schools are not always the bastions of common sense and concern for child welfare we would think. They can be entangled with the “family justice” and “child protection” systems in ways that can be extremely damaging.
Our story points to a worrying conclusion: corruption.
Unlawful registration
In 2020 my children were forced to return to Croatia against their will after I failed to defend a Hague child abduction case in the UK. After my children’s father, former spy and Croatian Customs Administration official Zvonimir Marinovic, took my children to Croatia on the pretence of a holiday and refused to return them, we became entangled in endless court hearings with horrifically bizarre and unlawful outcomes.
I knew it was very hard to defend Hague child abduction cases in the UK as the bar to prove grave risk of harm is set very high. However, a small chance was better than no chance in the child custody case in Croatia. Everything that happened in Croatia showed me we had absolutely no protection under Croatian law. Zvonimir had threatened me that if I didn’t drop the child abduction case and agree to stay in Croatia “they would go to live with him, the process has already been started”. It became clear this was not an empty threat, and this was not what my children wanted.
I knew Zvonimir was very well connected in political and legal circles. I did not think, at that point, that the court system was so corrupt that it would even affect child custody cases. I was not aware that a friend of his, the notorious politician Ingrid Anticevic Marinovic, had become a Constitutional Court judge, and only later found out she is very well connected in the Croatian family law system.
After three years of fighting, unemployed, for the right to bring my children back to England where we could be safe, supported by family and friends, and where I could make a living for us, I was desperate, concerned for the wellbeing of my children and myself. It was only after we managed to escape to England that I started to understand how horrific the way we had been treated by Zvonimir and the Croatian authorities was. It was confirmed that we had been victims of extreme coercive controlling behaviour, a criminal offence under UK law, and his behaviour was a marker that he was a danger to us. Instead of being helped by the Croatian courts, social services, police and other bodies, we had been secondarily victimised.
I am still learning how defective and unlawful the UK judgment ordering the return of my children to Croatia was. I have also learned that there are many mothers and children like us who are fighting for change in the way the Hague Convention on International Parental Child Abduction is used, and change I believe it will.
But here we were in Croatia in 2020, after Zvonimir had taken them from me the second time, crying their eyes out. My children’s state of wellbeing had deteriorated dramatically – one of my sons was, in the words of a friend, a shadow of his former self. They were begging me to help them get home, saying they felt trapped and imprisoned. Zvonimir tried to exclude me from attending appointments to get them registered in a Croatian school, the A.G. Matoš Elementary School in Zagreb.
I contacted the school and explained to their social worker what had happened in the family. She was sympathetic. I attended the appointment to have the children assessed by a teacher despite Zvonimir’s threats to report me for harassment. The teacher told us she did not consider the children could cope with school – they could barely speak Croatian.
We attended an appointment with the school doctor. She immediately echoed what the teacher had said. The children were not at all ready for school. They had spent 3 months in the care of Zvonimir and babysitters who did not help them with language, learning or any kind of task or play which would support their development. They were traumatised and insecure.
Accordingly, she told us she would refuse the application and recommend the children return to nursery school. At this point the children were 6 and had spent half a year successfully in an English primary school, which they loved and where they had flourished. The doctor told us that British schools are far less rigid and more child-centred.
Zvonimir said he would dispute her recommendation and asked her who the Board was. “I AM the Board”, she replied.
I took the children to a neuropsychologist to investigate some concerns including their state following their forced return to Croatia and separation from me. She said the exact same thing. English schools are far from perfect, but Croatian schools, in my estimation, are pretty much still in the 1950s. The monotonous, routine tasks my children had to do in Croatian school were things I had never had to do during my English education in the 1980s, and my children found it very tough.
A letter came through from the Zagreb Board for Education rejecting the application to register the children in school. I was relieved. At least something appeared to be working as it should in Croatia.
The Ministry
In early September, after a summer of quibbling over the time I was entitled to spend with the children, I took them camping. On 4 September I received an email from Zvonimir telling me to bring them back as they would be going to school on Monday.
(You can see from this email what the communication was like at that time: “In the email which I sent you on 28 August I clearly indicated that the children will stay with you from 2 September at 9 AM until Friday 4 September at 7 PM, which you confirmed in your response shortly after”. He was ordering me around, violating court orders and preventing me from spending time I was entitled to with the children, and which they needed. You may be cheered to know I defied him and enforced my rights where necessary. But it was very frightening and stressful, for me and the children.
On what basis should the children go to school, I asked? I knew he was going to appeal the decision, but other mothers had told me there was a process to go through and nothing could be decided without the involvement of professionals.
We carried on enjoying a lovely camping holiday and spending time with family in the countryside.
On Monday 7 September another email arrived:
This time he was sending me documents to register the children in school. Most odd. I had heard nothing about it. Why would HE be sending me the documents? Why didn’t the school? They had my contact details.
8 September. Another email. This time exhorting me to ring a teacher, Renata Janković. This seemed premature. I rang the admissions office, and they confirmed to me: the children were not registered in the school.
I believe it was 10 September when my lawyer and I attended an appointment at the Zagreb Maksimir branch of social services. Social worker Vesna Moštak-Skupnjak was irate: she had just received a letter from the Ministry of Education saying the children were to be registered in school after all. This was completely unprecedented. It circumvented all of the required procedures. She told us this was clearly a matter of Zvonimir using public institutions to gain advantage for himself at the expense of the children’s wellbeing. She told us I should go to the Croatian TV watchdog programme “Provjereno”. We asked about making a formal complaint, but she indicated she didn’t have much faith in official procedures.
This is not the only time Croatian officials have told me that they have no faith in the institutions they represent.
Here is the Ministry’s decision for one of my sons:
Note that the decision was signed by Minister Fuchs himself. That’s quite unusual. It was dated Friday 4 September, and we received it days later.
My questions:
How did Zvonimir know that the decision would be issued days before anyone else received it?
How did the staff at the A.G. Matos school know that the children may be attending the school before the decision was issued?
What compelled Minister Fuchs to issue this decision in a completely unlawful way?
What the Fuchs was going on?
Administrative Court
My lawyer, Sanja Bezbradica Jelavic, told me I could file a complaint about the Ministry’s decision at the Croatian Administrative Court. She didn’t hold out much hope for a good outcome: she told me “It’s almost impossible to function in Croatia, nothing works.” However, I was particularly irked by the behaviour of arrogant, ageing men at the expense of vulnerable children, so I decided to proceed.
It took more than a year for the case to be processed, but on 16 December 2021 we received a judgment – the Ministry of Education had acted unlawfully by registering the children in the school. At the tender age of 8 they won their first court case against the State.
However, by this time my children had been in the school for more than a year, and nobody could tell me how I could get them out.
Domestic abuse
As soon as my children started at the school, I quickly asked for a meeting with the Head, Antonio Jurčev. I felt it was important for the school to be aware of what was happening in my children’s lives. I was also not prepared to be a passenger in a process out of my control – if my children’s father had Mr Jurčev’s ear, so would I.
I remember his words at that meeting: “your situation is nothing to do with this school”.
Unfortunately this attitude is all too prevalent in schools. Schools are entrusted with the care of children for as much as 8 hours a day. Of course it’s important for schools to know if children are going through traumatic experiences in their home lives. Of course they have to know if there is domestic abuse in the family. This is regardless of whether children are seen as the “direct” victims of domestic abuse. Even if a parent is the target, children suffer the fallout and are now considered victims in their own right in UK law. I don’t care that this is Croatia and not the UK. Any sensible adult should know that ill-treating your partner is not a predictor of good parenting. Schools need to understand domestic abuse, and how to behave towards adult and child victims in a safe and sensitive way.
Teaching staff
I engaged with the school staff and the first year passed. My children would tell me of crying at school, of frustration, of struggling. They came home with reports of bullying, in one instance with a large open wound from being pushed down steps by another child. I did what I could to make staff aware and to minimise the impact on the children.
At the end of the first year, at the start of summer holidays, one of my sons was crying every night at bedtime. He felt he didn’t have friends. The children told me that sometimes conflict with their father escalated into physical altercations and swearing, and that they spoke about that in class. At the beginning of the school year, I asked for a meeting, which was attended by the class teacher Renata Janković, Sanja Novosel, the teacher who cares for the children after class until their father picks them up from school, and Andreja Bartolić, the social worker. We discussed and agreed on the following:
That one of my sons’ frustration was spilling over into aggression towards other pupils and defiance towards adults
That he was telling the teacher that he found it hard to live split between two homes, that he didn’t know where he was, that he wanted to go back to England where he had a grandmother and grandfather, friends and a school he wanted to return to
That the teachers agreed that the ongoing uncertainty was impacting the children negatively
That the other child was having episodes of crying in school, at least once a week, and that had been going on for a year
That this child was unable to eat in school (he was having repeated episodes of losing weight)
That she had heard the boys talking about incidents with their father that caused her to wonder if she should take some kind of action
That the children felt lonely and did not fit in in school
That they had difficulties with the Croatian language, that one child found it difficult to function socially, and the other may have dyslexia, both of which were made worse by the language barrier.
I remember Renata Janković telling me: “these are not abused children”. I am not sure why she felt qualified to make that statement. I imagine that many experts WOULD feel that the above are indicators that the children are suffering… not only from the coercive control of their father but also from the institutional abuse they have been subjected to. No child should be held in limbo for so long. I know that social workers in Croatia are completely untrained in domestic abuse, and from what I saw of Renata Janković teachers are not trained either.
The team exhorted me not to talk with the children about what we were going through. I explained that it is not possible for children to be dragged through so many traumatic experiences, to be subject to litigation for so many years, and not to talk to them about it. This discussion indicated that in Croatia teaching staff are indoctrinated in “parental alienation” ideology, which has been spread very effectively throughout the “child protection” system in Croatia and silences the voice of children and victims of domestic abuse. I referred the staff to research by the UK Nuffield Family Justice Observatory that found that children whose parents are separating feel too little informed, too little consulted, and that this causes additional anxiety.
On 23 September 2021 I wrote to Andreja Bartolić. My lawyer had asked me whether the school could give me a note confirming that the above had been discussed. She replied on 28 September and said they do not issue written reports to parents. I would later learn a lesson which many parents will confirm:
Only communicate with schools, social services and other bodies in writing if you are in any kind of dispute. You need a written trace of all communications. If you have a telephone call or face to face meeting, record it - you have the legal right to do so. Be aware that face to face meetings can be used as opportunities for mobbing. Consider not engaging at all, or as little as possible.
Child custody
In June 2021 the Zagreb Maksimir branch of social services, after almost 7 months of delay, wrote a letter to the Municipal Court in Zlatar recommending the children live with me due to the poor parenting choices of their father. Then the “special guardian”, who had sat on her report for 10 months following an interview, during which the children told her clearly they wanted to live with me, quibbled due to the passage of time and recommended the authorities check – did the children really, really want to live with me? Because the children might have integrated by now! (By this time my children had already had 6 appointments with professionals, which is a complete violation of good practice – contact with professionals should be minimised).
Social services asked the school for a report and this was relatively faithful to the discussion we had had in the school:
“Sometimes the worry and uncertainty over, as they say, where they will live and with whom, gets overwhelming. They complain that they have had enough of travelling from dad to mum and the other way round. Further, they complain that they can no longer listen to which of their parents is to blame for what. At those times they have mixed emotions and reactions, and sometimes diametrically opposite. They become sad, withdrawn, thoughtful, irritable, even sometimes aggressive (verbally and physically) towards each other, towards other children, towards dad or mum, after school. They speak about those moments of roughness towards their parents, as well as about what is bothering them, out loud sometimes, in front of the whole class, with no prompting.”
I have to say, my children definitely have their moments of sadness and frustration, sometimes spilling over into anger, which is completely normal for children going through what they are going through. I feel the above description illustrates quite well how many children going through family court must be feeling, and I am sure many have a much, much worse time of it. But my children are very rarely, if ever, truly aggressive towards me. They are very good and kind children, and many professionals have commented over the years how well they are doing, despite the odds.
There was one sentence that concerned me a little:
“Their classmates have accepted them and they have for a long time been an inseparable part of the class group.”
This didn’t reflect how my children told me they felt. After the “special guardian” raised the spectre of the court for a second time refusing to let the children leave the country due to the passage of time, it felt like a risk. If a judge feels the children have integrated, they may very well rule they cannot move. Although this feels benign to the uninitiated, it is very common for the courts to deliberately drag their feet and then just rubber stamp the status quo.
Schools inspector
In March 2022 I wrote a letter to the Croatian Schools Inspectorate following reports from my children about the following:
Renata Janković hit my child, and other children in the first year (6 and 7 year olds), with a broom handle; hit a child with a heavy school bag, hit children them on the head with their pencil cases, hit their elbows if they rested their heads on their palms so their heads would fall on their desks
Threw a child’s school bag in the waste paper bin because it had been left on the floor, and made him leave it there all day
Made my children sit in the hot sun while they were put in time out as a punishment, refusing to let them sit in the shade
Responded to my child’s reports that he was unhappy by denying that was the case
Failed to report to me issues such as the children being unhappy and crying in class and incidents of physical conflict between my children and others, which I learned about from my children or third parties
Forced my children, who have diagnosed or suspected neurological issues, to stand completely still, to read loudly in front of the whole class even though this caused intense discomfort, and failed to inform me about difficulties that the children faced in class. I spoke to a special needs expert in the UK who considered this kind of treatment tortuous for the children.
There were other issues which I did not report which also concerned me:
Renata Janković told the class when my children joined that they lived with their father because their mother didn’t want them, which mortified them;
While teaching a class on telling right from wrong she was horrified when my son asked “so why did nothing happen to our dad when he took us from our mum?” Her response was to immediately tell dad.
This gives me the sense that the school system is equally insensitive (callous?) about children’s rights and feelings as the court system and social services, equally committed to silencing the voice of the child, and equally likely to side with an abusive parent.
I had attempted to address these issues directly with Renata Janković, as my children were reporting feeling very unhappy about going to school. Her response each time was to go on the defensive:
"We are running late. X is crying and doesn't want to go to school as I have to return home and they are unhappy in Croatia and in the school. The children are telling me that you get angry when they say that they are unhappy here. Don't do that! They have the right to their own opinion and voice. Read the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child."
"Good morning. I think that would be enough of accusations with no grounds!!!! I kindly ask you to find time for an urgent meeting in the school!!! You will get an appointment when I agree it with Andreja".
"The grounds are the words of my children. I am not your pupil to be ordered around, so watch your tone."
It makes me so sad to think of all the times when my children cried desperately, not wanting to leave me, not wanting to go to school, just because of the illegal actions of a bunch of hairy ageing men, with the help of their handmaidens, and how long I complied, putting my children through such a desperate situation, thinking things would work out lawfully in the end.
On 19 April 2022 I received an email from the Education and Teacher Training Agency confirming that they had imposed measures on this teacher to improve her educational methods.
My trust in this teacher was broken. Here my children were, stuck in a school they felt unhappy about, in which they were registered unlawfully, desperate to get back to England to the school they loved, while the people who were supposed to protect them were suppressing the reality of their experience - even actively harming them - and there was nothing I could do about it.
I tried to find out what measures were taken by the Agency, and wrote to them, to the Zagreb City office for education and to the school itself to request sight of the report, but none of them would provide it.
On 21 June 2021 I was sent a letter by the Ministry of Education’s Independent Sector for Inspection. It said:
"...it was established through the inspection of the immediate educational work of the teacher that no inappropriate actions of the teachers towards the pupils of Class 2C were established. As a consequence, the teacher was not issued with measures by the schools inspectorate."
If someone could correct my understanding of Croatian I would be grateful, but to me it looks like I have two communications with exactly the opposite content: one from the Inspectorate itself, and a second one from the parallel dimension of the Ministry of Education.
What happened here? Did the school make a quick request to cover up evidence of child abuse by the teacher? (Corporate punishment is prohibited by law in Croatia). It’s easy when the minister doesn’t give a Fuchs. Hey presto! Just print a barefaced lie, and all evidence disappears. It’s magic!
Other parents tell me of parallel record keeping (two copies: one authentic, one fake), and all sorts of jiggery-pokery.
If this isn’t the case, why didn’t they simply let me see the report?
I investigated further. I made a subject access request to the school to review my children’s files – the documents on registration, their school work and grades, everything. This was denied twice on the basis that the request was “too broad” so couldn’t be fulfilled. These particular letters are lost for the moment among piles of pointless paperwork distributed over 2 countries, but here’s a similar letter refusing access to case files received by a journalist asking for information on the issuance of documents for the illegal adoption of children from Congo to Croatia from the very same court hearing our cases, the Municipal Court in Zlatar:
Evidently this is a standard procedure when a body wishes to obfuscate a request for information. The school has breached my right of access to information and is liable to pay a fine, but I have bigger fish to fry.
Court again
On 3 November 2022 the school sent the following in a letter to the court:
“The mother does not come to the school meetings for parents. She asks and expects to be provided with immediate information about the children, and at the same time has resolutely refused to come to the school since the middle of the second year. She asks for information in writing only, via different digital platforms or over the phone. When I don't respond to her messages immediately (because I am in class) she threatens "another report to the Schools Inspector".
“Last year the mother reported me to the Education and Teacher Training Agency for "physical punishment and inappropriate acts towards the children". After a school inspection, the statements of the mother were not confirmed (Report of the Education and Teacher Training Agency on teacher supervision Class: 602-02/22-02/21 Reg no. 562-05-01/1-22-2 of 14 April 2022). I have the impression that the mother wishes to professionally discredit me as the teacher of her boys. During the last period in written communications the mother frequently wished to impose her opinion that the boys were not happy in the school in Croatia, that they weren't accepted, that they weren't successful and that it would be better for them in England. I told the mother several times that I could not agree with this, which led to the mother being dissatisfied.”
I consider that it is necessary to further encourage the mother to cooperate with the school as other parents do, through personal contact and normal channels of communciation (attendance at parents meetings in person etc.) I have the impression that the exceptionally negative stance of the mother towards the institutions of Croatia, including the school system has a negative impact on her cooperation with the teachers in the school.
- Renata Janković
Following repeated invitations from the teacher Renata Janković to the children X and Y Marinovic to come to parents' meetings, the School sent the mother twice (on 24 May and 23 June 2022) an invitation to a meeting with the teacher, the professional service and the head. The mother confirmed her attendance at the first, but immediately afterwards informed the school that she did not wish to come to a meeting but sought communication by email. She did not respond to the second invitation.
- Kind regards,
Antonio Jurčev, Head”
I would be interested to hear how others interpret these things, but for me the worst aspect is the high-handed assumption that she, a teacher, who has known the children for about two years, and meets them for about four hours a day, amid 20 other children, knows better than their own mother what they think, how they feel and what is best for them. She knows better than the children themselves! I would like to warn other parents that you will meet this attitude among people in the structures of the state. It is extremely dangerous how this undermines motherhood, parenthood, and the rights and dignity of families. Most importantly, it undermines child safety in the hands of the uninformed and the bigot. Especially if there is even a whiff of corruption.
This is how children are trafficked by the State - because the State assumes that only the State is all-knowing. However, many children caught in the clutches of institutions know all too well that the Corporate Parent is usually a terrible parent. And when it comes to court:
“The responsibilities of judges in disputes between the citizen and the state have increased together with the growth in governmental functions over the last century. The responsibility of the judiciary to protect citizens against unlawful acts of government has thus increased, and with it the need for the judiciary to be independent of government.”
“It is vital that each judge is able to decide cases solely on the evidence presented in court by the parties and in accordance with the law.”
Source: https://www.judiciary.uk/about-the-judiciary/our-justice-system/jud-acc-ind/independence/
However, we find that courts will unquestioningly accept the word of a teacher, social worker etc. as having more weight than a parent, who DOES know their own child best, who usually is focused on protecting the child, and who can provide compelling evidence.
Janković’s dismay at my exceptionally negative stance towards the Croatian institutions is mildly amusing in the light of EU reports illustrating the catastrophic state of the rule of law in Croatia.
It is not clear to me how these people think that I can just drop in for a chat and for parents’ evenings. I live 1000 miles. Even when I am in Croatia it is a 45 mile round trip. Among all the generous invitations to court, social services, “therapy” etc. I am too depleted of energy to be making a 2 hour round trip every time the teacher wants a chat. All of this is a concerted effort to force me to bend to the will of the father and move myself, my children, my parents even, to Croatia, where I have never been able to secure a living. I am sure that many victims of the family courts will recognise this kind of mobbing.
Yes, I do expect to be proactively informed about my children’s progress and problems, like any parent would. I am very sorry Antonio Jurčev, but if you are going to participate in aiding and abetting child theft, trafficking and abuse, unlawfully taking two young children from a British mother, you are going to have to make the logistical adjustments to deal with it. Ask your minister for help.
No, I am not interested in sitting in front of a mob of people who will try to bully me into “seeing the error of my ways”. I know the law, I know my own mind and know my children. I have had enough of institutional bullying to last a lifetime. Sorry.
No, I am not going to sit with a group of parents which includes my ex husband, who has abused my children and I horrifically, in a school my children are not lawfully registered in, in a country they are not supposed to be in.
I believe my children. When they tell me they don’t like the school, I believe them. I can see for myself what the quality of the education is like. I can see that they can’t understand what they are reading. I can see the state of the school.
If my child tells me the teacher hit him and made him sit in the hot sun, I believe him. Especially if the teacher accuses him of lying instead of addressing my concerns in a calm and constructive manner.
You might not believe my children do not like you, Renata Janković, but this is what they told an independent expert witness. Like the expert witness, you have chosen to ignore what they say, thinking you know better. However, they know their own minds, Renata. They do not like you.
“He describes how he went to school in England for one year and it was better for him than in Croatia where he has been going for two years, because the food is better and the teacher "shouts less". He adds that he has more friends in England, but on the mobile phone,..”
“Burdened by the family dynamics, and also the way of life and information that they have about England, which they idealise, while they criticise Croatia, describing their time in nursery school as negative, chaos, and the teacher in the school as strict.”
“He idealises the life he describes in England, and is critical of Croatia”.
“Like his brother, he describes the school in Croatia negatively.”
“In Croatia he is always in trouble in school because he cannot keep still.”
The system may currently be set up to silence the voice of the child. But, Renata, you have just been teaching the children about child rights (brava!). They are asking me, how come they have no rights? No voice?
Decrepit
Why would a school want to get involved in shenanigans and corruption, participating in trafficking children into the care of an abusive father?
It could be that these cases are solved to order, and a parent who has sufficient political connections can do what they like.
But speaking with other parents, many note connections between courts, social services, schools and other agencies, working in a manner that was described in this excellent article as court sanctioned child abuse.
One explanation is that the authorities that own the schools and social services are very often one and the same. If financial policies motivate behaviours that are not compatible with child welfare, then the outcomes are unlikely to be desirable.
When I am talking about negative behaviours, that includes people within the system gaining personally from certain actions. When I think about the state of the A.G. Matos school, it is not clear to me whether it’s a result of state underfunding, or of money being channelled in directions other than those intended.
The pavement in front of the school has now been newly paved, but when my children started it was cracked and crumbling. The buildings are made of thin materials, so in summer, when temperatures in Zagreb hover around 35 degrees Celsius, the temperature in the south-facing classrooms is unbearable. The ancient electrics are unable to bear the load of air conditioning units. During the 2020 earthquake, the school kitchen was so badly damaged it was out of use for at least 2 years.
The playground is not fenced off, and in the evenings is frequented by people who litter and break glass bottles. I have had to warn teachers of broken glass and ask if a caretaker could sweep it up. They never did, leaving it to the children, to my horror, to pick it up and place it in the grass. My son, after being beaten up by one of his classmates, ran away and made it across the road before one of the teachers caught up with him. He was 8.
It doesn’t make me feel the least bit better to hear reports of attempted kidnaps of children in the area.
The food is so bad that neither of my children can eat it. One of my sons tells me that one particular meal was so bad that the entire class felt sick for two days.
I have seen plenty of schools in other Croatian communities which are not in such a bad state of repair. The reviews on Google do not paint a pretty picture of this school.
A little massage (edit)
After publishing this article, I noticed that YET ANOTHER scandal was in the Croatian news, this time that the son of Croatian President Zoran Milanović is a recipient of a scholarship worth 358 EUR per month, which is more than many Croatian people earn in a month. One of the criteria for attaining this was academic excellence, yet in 2022 it was reported that a schoolteacher was pressurised by the child’s mother and the head teacher to raise the boy’s grades. The Croatian Office for Anti-Corruption and Organised Crime are still investigating this case.
It certainly isn’t a stretch to conclude that the A.G. Matos school may be giving my children’s grades a little massage to give their father a helping hand in keeping them trapped in Croatia. My children categorically deny they are getting “more than” top grades, as their father claims.
Where we are now
In February 2023 my children started to complain of stomach pains, sickness, headaches and show other forms of distress when it came to time to go back to their father’s and back to school.
It started with a couple of sick days when I wasn’t sure what was going on. As I did school work with them, I realised that they were reading without comprehension. They said they were struggling.
I decided to put a stop to the charade of “officialdom” in Croatia. They will not torment my children any longer.
The school is a good hour’s drive from my family’s flat in Croatia, especially during the rush hour. I cannot take the children to school on a daily basis like that, and the children are refusing to go back to their dad’s. As soon as they are back in school, they will be back at dad’s like a shot and in the grip of the corrupt, unlawful Croatian “authorities”.
It’s time for the Croatian “authorities” to stop messing us around. That includes the courts, social services, “special guardians” and schools. The past 6.5 years have been exhausting, distressing and terrifying for the children and I.
There is one very simple solution, as my child said to me recently. Let them go back to their school in England. Problem solved.
To the parents of the children in class 3C: I am sorry not to have felt able to be part of your group. I hope this story helps you understand why. I am sorry that your children may miss mine, and I hope you will reach out so we can keep in touch. I hope your children will do well in this school despite everything, and live rich and happy lives. I hope this story going public may make things change for the better. I am sure you understand there is no bond stronger on this earth than between a mother and child, and nothing more important. I wish you all the best.