Dragutin Lesar

Dragutin Lesar (born 4 March 1956) is a retired Croatian politician. Originally a union leader in the 1980s, he joined the liberal Croatian People's Party (HNS) in 1996. As member of HNS he was elected to the Croatian Parliament in the 2003 and 2007 general elections and served in the 5th and 6th Sabor. In April 2008 he resigned from HNS and continued to serve in the parliament as an independent. He attended a primary school in Mačkovec, and later Šenkovec, where he moved in 1953. During the local elections in 1997 he was holder of the list for Međimurje County and candidate for House of Counties of Croatian Sabor. His rivals were Franjo Tuđman, Ivica Račan, Vlado Gotovac and Drago Stipac. He won 14.66% of votes and thus he did not enter the Sabor, but he did succeed in winning 5 seats for County Assembly and made a coalition with Croatian Social Liberal Party and Croatian Peasant Party and thus removed Croatian Democratic Union from ruling role. Lesar became prefect's deputy. During 2000, Međimurje County Assembly accepts Lesar's proposal for foundation of Međimurje solidarity foundation "Katruža", and he becomes the manager of the foundation. On local elections in 2001 he won 6 seats and formed the same coalition and again becomes prefect's deputy.

During the Croatian parliamentary elections of 2003, Lesar was the top-ranked candidate of the electoral list of HNS for the 3rd Electoral District. HNS won 2 seats, so Lesar entered in Sabor along with Radimir Čačić. During the parliamentary elections of 2007 he again became member of the parliament, but due to conflict with newly elected president of the HNS Radimir Čačić, he left HNS and acted as independent member of parliament since April 2008.

On 31 March 2010 Lesar founded Croatian Labourists – Labour Party and became its president. He competed in the 2011 Croatian parliamentary election and won six seats in parliament. He resigned as party president in May 2014 after losing a seat in the European elections 2014. After his term in the Croatian parliament ended in September 2015, he announced his retirement from politics.

Personal life In 1977 he married Anica, who gave birth to their son, Igor, the same year. In 1984, they got a daughter, Maja.