Hrvoje Kačić

Hrvoje Kačić (13 January 1932 – 14 February 2023) was a Croatian water polo player, legal scholar and politician.

Hrvoje Kačić

Kačić in 1956
Medal record
Men’s Waterpolo
Representing Yugoslavia
Olympic Games
Silver medal – second place1956 MelbourneTeam Competition
European Championship
Silver medal – second place1958 BudapestTeam Competition
Bronze medal – third place1950 ViennaTeam Competition
Mediterranean Games
Gold medal – first place1959 BeirutTeam Competition

Biography

Kačić was born in Dubrovnik on 13 January 1932.[1] At the age of 18, Kačić played for the Yugoslavia national water polo team at the 1950 European Water Polo Championship at which the team won bronze.[2] During the 1950s he became out of favour with Yugoslavia's communist regime and had his passport confiscated on three occasions.[2] He was jailed by the regime in 1952 which prevented him from joining the national team at the 1952 Summer Olympics.[2] He was also expelled from university.

Kačić competed with the national team at the 1956 Summer Olympics, during which his friend and teammate Ivo Štakula defected to Australia.[2] In 1957, he was awarded the Sportske novosti Croatian Sportsman of the Year. At the 1959 Mediterranean Games he won a gold medal.[1] On the club level he was a long-time member of Croatian waterpolo club Jug from Dubrovnik, multiple national champion.

In 1956 he finished a degree in law.[3] He later finished a doctorate in law in 1965 at the University of Zagreb, specializing in maritime law.[4] Kačić also wrote about history.[5] He has collaborated with Ivo Pilar Institute of History.[6]

Kačić was elected to the Croatian Parliament for the first time in the country's first democratic elections in 1990 as an independent candidate.[7] From 1994 to 2001 he was president of the State Commission for Borders of the Republic of Croatia.[7]

In 1994 he received the Croatian Olympic Committee's Matija Ljubek Award.[8] He has served on the committee which gives out the Franjo Bučar State Award for Sport.[9] Kačić still actively supported Croatian water polo, retaining a position in the Croatian Water Polo Federation and supporting the national team.[10]

Kačić died on 14 February 2023, at the age of 91.[11]

See also

References
  1. Gizdić, Jurica (2016). Hrvatski olimpijci i odličnici (PDF) (in Croatian). Croatian Olympic Committee. p. 263. ISBN 978-953-7912-05-5. Retrieved 22 January 2020.
  2. "Olimpijske legende: Hrvoje Kačić". Olimp (in Croatian). Croatian Olympic Committee (15). June 2005. Archived from the original on 16 June 2013. Retrieved 23 May 2013.
  3. Reprinted and new edition of Hrvoje Kačić's U službi domovine
  4. Granting recognition
  5. Partisans killed Croatian anti-fascists Archived 8 December 2008 at the Wayback Machine, Hrvoje Kačić, Glas Koncila
  6. News in short Archived 30 May 2009 at the Wayback Machine, Croatian Radiotelevision
  7. "Hrvoje Kačić". matica.hr (in Croatian). Matica hrvatska. Retrieved 28 January 2020.
  8. Matija Ljubek Award
  9. Recipients of the Franjo Bučar State Award for Sport in 2002
  10. "Vaterpoliste dočekalo 30.000 ljudi" [Waterpolo players met by 30,000]. Nacional (in Croatian). 3 April 2007. Archived from the original on 17 July 2012. Retrieved 30 June 2012.
  11. "Umro srebrni hrvatski olimpijac i jedan od najvećih igrača Juga u povijesti". Index.hr. 14 February 2023. Retrieved 16 February 2023.
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