Slovak Elections and Politics | Fico the Fourth 🇸🇰

[RGM2609]

Thanks a lot! Since you mentioned Sme Rodina, how did they manage to shield themselves from the electoral consequences of being in that mess of a government? And I understand that they don't really exist on the pro/anti Smer division line and didn't get their votes based on that, but shouldn't their likely switching of sides following the election be at least somewhat controversial?

[Estrella]

Thanks a lot! Since you mentioned Sme Rodina, how did they manage to shield themselves from the electoral consequences of being in that mess of a government? And I understand that they don't really exist on the pro/anti Smer division line and didn't get their votes based on that, but shouldn't their likely switching of sides following the election be at least somewhat controversial?

Kollár's two big promises in 2020 were a repossession amnesty and building X thousand units of social housing. He delivered on both and then managed to position himself as the voice of sanity in the Matovič vs Sulík conflict. He's been very quiet lately, presumably to draw as little attention as possible to the fact his party is still in government. I don't think switching sides would be controversial: their voters don't really care and an economically populist and socially conservative party is a better fit for a Smer/Hlas coalition anyway. Kollár and Fico don't seem to like each other much, but I don't think that will be a big obstacle.

[Estrella]

Minister of Agriculture Samuel Vlčan offered his resignation yesterday after the revelation that a recycling company in which he's the majority shareholder was scheduled to get a €1.4 million grant from the Ministry of Environment. A scandal, yes, but under normal circumstances not something that would end the whole government. But Heger seems to have panicked and went on TV later that day to give a speech.

Chaos was being encouraged by people who are afraid of justice, like Fico, and extremists who hate our democracy. But, friends, today I want to tell you that we brought chaos too. Yes, I admit, undoubtedly I have my share of blame for the chaos too. I was looking at the arguments between Matovič, Sulík and others. I bit my tongue and suffered through their arguments and conflicts. But I did it to prevent instability. Today I know that it brought even bigger chaos. In the name of people who carry responsibility for the country and in my name, I want to say: I am sorry. The only way I can  repent for my mistakes is by trying to bring Slovakia to democratic parliamentary elections in stability and peace. I want to do it as the Prime Minister. [...] I cannot imagine a technocratic government* coming to power now. Our ministers would be replaced by people who might have good intentions, but don't have the experience. [...] They would have to learn and would endanger the little stability we managed to keep. Hard times await Slovakia, and I don't want to throw my responsiblity onto others.

_{* the Slovak term is úradnícka vláda, literally "government of civil servants"}

Now, not only is this very partisan for an official speech to the nation and extremely and hilariously desperate in the same way as a sleazy boyfriend coming up with bullshxt excuses to stop his girlfriend breaking up with him, it also tells us that Heger being replaced by a technocratic government is being seriously considered as an option. As you can guess, this speech didn't exactly help his cause. Foreign Minister Rastislav Káčer (a member of Heger's party!) called it "a horrible blunder". As one editorial put it, Heger basically just asked the President to fire him. The cabinet has lost a confidence vote and whether it can stay in power depends only on President's good graces. She'll be away in London for the coronation, but on Monday I expect all hell to break loose. 

[Estrella]

Foreign Minister Rastislav Káčer (a member of Heger's party!) called it "a horrible blunder".

And Káčer announced he's resigning. So that's two ministers gone in two days. Even funnier, the linked article claims to have been told that "it is questionable whether he will remain in the Democrats after his resignation".

[Estrella]

Pretty much every opposition politician of note condemned Heger's speech as misuse of public broadcasting for political purposes. Smer, Hlas, SaS and KDH are calling for the President to sack the cabinet. Boris Kollár is opposed (obviously) and says a change of government would only bring more chaos, but "the situation is developing in the direction of a technocratic cabinet". Matovič says a technocratic government would be the proof of a conspiracy by the President to help the PS (-_-), but expects it to happen anyway. The President gave a brief statement from London, saying she's going to meet Heger as soon as she returns.

Someone please put them out of their misery.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

The Matovic/Heger experiment finally collapsing from a fairly uninspired corruption by a not especially important minister would be so poetic. To be brought down by such an underwhelming final straw.

[Estrella]

Another poll has been released. This one is more interesting than most because it has crosstabs by age. Unsurprisingly for a post-communist country, there's a fxcking massive generation gap.

All voters
▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅ Smer 17.7%
▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅ Hlas 17.0%
▅▅▅▅▅▅▅ PS 13.1%
▅▅▅▅▅ Republika 9.8%
▅▅▅ Sme rodina 6.1%
▅▅▅ KDH 6.0%
▅▅▅ OĽaNO 5.6%
▅▅▅ SaS 5.2%
――――――――――――――――――
▅▅ Szövetség 4.3%
▅▅ SNS 4.0%
▅▅ Demokrati 3.6%
▅ ĽSNS 2.7%
▅▅▅ Others 4.9%

Older than 60
▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅ Smer 30.5%
▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅ Hlas 17.8%
▅▅▅▅▅ KDH 10.8%
▅▅▅▅ Republika 6.5%
▅▅▅ SNS 5.4%
――――――――――――――――――
▅▅ PS 4.5%
▅▅ Sme rodina 4.2%
▅▅ OĽaNO 3.8%
▅▅ Szövetség 3.6%
▅▅ Demokrati 3.1%
▅ SaS 2.8%
▅▅▅▅ Others 7.0%

Younger than 30
▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅▅ PS 26.7%
▅▅▅▅▅▅▅ Republika 13.5%
▅▅▅▅▅ SaS 10.3%
▅▅▅▅▅ Smer 9.3%
▅▅▅▅▅ Hlas 9.2%
▅▅▅ Sme rodina 6.7%
▅▅▅ OĽaNO 5.7%
――――――――――――――――――
▅▅ Szövetség 3.4%
▅▅ Demokrati 3.1%
▅▅ KDH 3.0%
▅▅▅▅ Others 9.1%

[Estrella]

IT'S OVER

The departure of four ministers from Eduard Heger's caretaker government means that after two years and one month it has come to and end. Heger admitted this on Sunday, after having tried to change the course of events with his Thursday speech, even though he already knew then that President Zuzana Čaputová wanted to dismiss his government.

Ahead of the afternoon meeting with the president, Heger announced that he was resigning and returning the mandate to act as prime minister to the president. He said he had offered her other options, but she refused all of them. The President will now appoint a caretaker government.

"Among those alternatives was filling the vacant ministerial posts with her nominees. I also offered the alternative that I would not lead the government and only the people responsible for the ministries where replacement would be risky would remain ministers," Heger said. "That is no longer on the table, which is why I'm now asking the president to relieve me of my mandate," he explained.

"I have therefore decided to ask the President to be relieved of my mandate, thus leaving her the room to try to bring Slovakia to democratic parliamentary elections in a stable and calm manner with a caretaker government," Eduard Heger announced.

ngl I expected him to hold on like a barnacle, but I guess he had the good sense to see he's done.

[RGM2609]

Will Heger now try to do anything to salvage his failed party? Is there anything he could do, really? Could he try to attach himself to another party? It seems to me like too many important individuals joined for it to just go down quietly

[Estrella]

Will Heger now try to do anything to salvage his failed party? Is there anything he could do, really? Could he try to attach himself to another party? It seems to me like too many important individuals joined for it to just go down quietly

It seems that Democrats expected voters to see them as the great white hope of anti-Ficoism and flock to them en masse as the only way to stop his return. That obviously didn't happen, and so the plan B was, I assume, to use Heger's PM chair and statesmanlike stature to siphon enough voters off OĽaNO, SaS, PS and KDH to get a respectable result. That plan went up in flames today and I doubt anybody who wasn't a part of the 3-5% who said they'd vote for Heger when he was PM would even think of it now. That leaves only one option, the one you mentioned: convince some poor sods to run with his party in a coalition. Mind you, that would open another can of worms – the threshold for coalitions is 7% rather than 5% – but let's look at the options:

- PS will tell them to get fxcked. They're polling so well precisely because there are many liberal voters who wouldn't touch anyone involved in the Matovič/Heger disaster with a bargepole.

- Ditto for SaS. They left the Heger cabinet for a reason. Admittedly that reason was Matovič, but the no confidence vote burnt the bridges with Heger too.

- OĽaNO might not be as crazy as it sounds, but Matovič's ego is too big for that. It would probably also scare off people who like Heger but not Matovič (i.e. everyone who now says they'd vote for the Dems) and push the coalition under 7%.

- KDH is the option many journos have been talking about since the Dems were founded (which tells you a lot about how successful they were expected to be). KDH is polling only just above the threshold, about 5-7%, which puts them in a dilemma: they could run alone and risk narrowly falling short of 5% as they did in the last two elections, or they could run with the Dems and risk that enough of the latter's votes leave, making them fall short of 7%. Moreover, there are quite a lot of liberals in Heger's party who wouldn't really get on with the social conservatives in KDH and vice versa.

- Szövetség/Alliance is also an option. Like the old SMK, they're a moderate liberal-conservative party and like the Dems they're consistently polling below the threshold. I guess it could be a Hail Mary for both parties if all else fails.

- Sme rodina is smart enough no to do it. Every other party is out of the question.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

This does not feel like an opposition you would dislike having if you were Fico.

[Estrella]

The President held a brief press conference where she curtly announced she was going to dismiss Heger anyway and will name a nonpartisan caretaker cabinet during the week starting May 15. The new Prime Minister will be the 46 years old economist Ľudovít Ódor. Since 2018 he has served as the deputy chairman of Slovakia's central bank. He used to work as a market analyst at a private bank, as a member of the Council for Budgetary Responsibility and advisor of PM Iveta Radičová and Minister of Finance Ivan Mikloš (both from SDKÚ, but he was never a member of any party). He also runs a blog where he describes himself thusly:

My name is Ľudovít Ódor and I am an economist. I know, it's not something amazing, but I enjoy it. Am I a Keynesian, a diehard Hayekian, a Marxist or even a member of the Luddite cult? I will disappoint you, my ideology is pragmatism, economic policy based on modern methods and data, and a belief that a successful society needs educated people, sensible rules, and quality institutions. I have always tried to be a multifunctional economist: something between a builder, a doctor and an interpreter.

[Estrella]

Habemus cabinetum!

Prime Minister: Ľudovít Ódor, introduced above.
Deputy Prime Minister in charge of the Recovery Plan: Lívia Vašáková, an economist who worked for the European Commission and the Cabinet Office now gets tasked with distributing the money from EU recovery funds.
Minister of Finance: Michal Horváth, chief economist of the National Bank, EU liaison during the process of Slovakia's entry into the eurozone.
Minister of Foreign Affairs: Miroslav Wlachovský, foreign policy advisor of Eduard Heger and Mikuláš Dzurinda, ambassador to Denmark, worked with Miroslav Lajčák (Smer's foreign minister, 2012-2020) on his successful candidacy for President of the UN General Assembly.
Minister of Interior: Ivan Šimko, old centre-right apparatchik who has held every ministry imaginable (Interior, Defense, Justice, Interior again), founding member of KDH which he left for SDKÚ, left SDKÚ in 2004 for Free Forum when he was fired as minister, left the Forum when he wasn't elected leader, founded a party of his own which won all of 0.6% in 2006, disbanded it and rejoined KDH again in 2010.
Minister of Defence: Martin Sklenár, director of defence policy section at the ministry, previously an attaché at the Slovak embassy in Washington.
Minister of Health: Michal Palkovič, pathologist, currently state secretary at the Ministry (i.e. junior minister).
Minister of Justice: Jana Dubovcová, former human rights ombudsman, MP for SDKÚ 2010-2012, parliamentary candidate for PS-Spolu in 2020.
Minister of Economy: Peter Dovhun, director of the national grid operator and various private companies (among others, branches of Motorola and Microsoft).
Minister of Transport: Pavol Lančarič, former director of the Slovak branch of mobile operator Orange, previously worked for the Antitrust Office and various private companies (Deloitte, Tchibo etc.)
Minister of Labour: Soňa Gáborčáková, former MP elected for OĽaNO in 2016, left the party together with some of the people that would go on to found Za ľudí, but she joined KDH instead, unsuccesfully stood for parliament in 2020 and then served under Milan Krajniak from Sme rodina as state secretary in charge of family and social policy. Respected for her charity work with disabled young people but also controversial for her connections to anti-abortion organizations.
Minister of Culture: Silvia Hroncová, former director of the Slovak National Theatre and director of the opera at the Czech National Theatre.
Minister of Agriculture: Jozef Bíreš, director of the State Veterinary and Food Administration since 2010. In his thirteen years in this position he served under six ministers and five PMs.
Minister of Investments and Informatization: Peter Balík, director of the Ministry's section for innovation, strategic investments and analysis, IT specialist with the office of Czechia's permanent representative to the UN, worked for the ministries of Finance and Economy (both under Smer), the Health Policy institute and the European Central Bank.
Minister of Education: Daniel Bútora, a student activist around the time of Velvet Revolution and director of the Slovak section of Radio Free Europe. Interestingly, he's also the director of the C. S. Lewis School Association, a group of private schools run by the Church of the Brethren: an evangelical church founded in the 19th century by returning emigrants from America that sees itself as something of a spiritual successor to the Hussites. I feel like Lewis would've flipped his lid if he heard this, but hey, they seem to be pretty good schools.
Minister of Environment: Milan Chrenko, former director of the section for international and EU relations at the Ministry, worked for the European Environment Agency.

All I can say is that we finally have a cabinet of people who know what they're doing. Sir Humphrey is running the ministry now, and that's a good thing – especially when the only thing you need to do is keep the lights on until the election with as little drama as possible. It's also a well-balanced cabinet: men vs women (at least compared to previous ones), genepool centre-right vs genepool Smer, neutral civil servants vs old hands from politics. It's also very #globalist, what with all those corporate execs and EU bureaucrats. That's something I appreciate on its merits but also because it triggers all the right people.

[Estrella]

Why don't the Hungarians support Hungarian minority interest parties anymore?

Slovak nationalists moved on from scaremongering about Hungary to imitating it, that's the most important thing. But it's also because of the decay of the Hungarian parties. The old SMK was a cohesive party with a strong machine, many mayors and councillors, connections to cultural organizations and actual accomplishments under their belt. Even though SMK, Most and some of the other splinters have reunited now, they're seen (rightly IMO) as a bunch of feuding, self-obsessed has-beens.

OĽaNO MP György Gyimesi – remembered for his opposition to sending weapons to Ukraine and for attempting to ban the display of the rainbow flag on public buildings – left his party a few weeks ago. He has been recruited by Szövetség/Aliancia/Alliance in an obvious desperate attempt to attract some media attention. The stunt that was supposed to be a Hail Mary to raise their poll numbers above the threshold immediately backfired in a spectacular fashion: Most-Híd announced it's leaving the Alliance. This resulted in even more chaos: Alliance's leader, previously quoted as saying that the departure of one of the factions would mean the dissolution of the Alliance now says that a faction cannot leave the party and its members can only leave as individuals. Apparently even the rump Most isn't united because the Trebišov district section of the party/faction/platform/whatever announced they're staying.

tl;dr lol

[DavidB.]

Today, oligarch Marian Kocner was acquitted in the case of the murder of journalist Jan Kuciak, which sparked mass protests in 2018. The public prosecutor had demanded a lifelong jail sentence.

[Storr]

Today, oligarch Marian Kocner was acquitted in the case of the murder of journalist Jan Kuciak, which sparked mass protests in 2018. The public prosecutor had demanded a lifelong jail sentence.

"However, the District Court in Pezinok convicted co-defendant Alena Zsuzsavá of ordering and planning Kuciak's murder in February 2018. She received a 25-year prison sentence."

"According to the prosecution's indictment, Kočner tasked his associate and failed furniture business owner Alena Zsuzsová with arranging Kuciak's murder and she, in turn, tasked businessman Zoltán Andruskó, who ordered former soldier Miroslav Marček and his cousin Tomáš Szabó to carry out the murder.

Andruskó entered a plea agreement with the prosecution in December 2018 and was sentenced to 15 years — but also named Kočner as the individual who had ordered the murder."

[Storr]

This election will end in a mess:

https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1661643781253341187?s=20

https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1661640914266095617?s=20

https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1661638650470318082?s=20

[Storr]

Mentioning “maybe [if Smer wins] it will be more similar to Viktor Orbán-type of foreign policy" is definitely an easy way to grab the Brussels establishment's attention.

https://twitter.com/POLITICOEurope/status/1665030158149988354?s=20

[SnowLabrador]

Mentioning “maybe [if Smer wins] it will be more similar to Viktor Orbán-type of foreign policy" is definitely an easy way to grab the Brussels establishment's attention.

https://twitter.com/POLITICOEurope/status/1665030158149988354?s=20

Never did I imagine that Slovakia would be the weak link in NATO. Hopefully he doesn't win.

[Estrella]

The above posts tell you pretty much everything you need to know about the state of this country right now. Anyway, here's some commentary:

- The reasoning behind Kočner's not-guilty verdict (that his assistant Zsuzsová acted on her own initiative when hiring the hitmen) is not particularly believable, but who knows, maybe it is true. In any case, at least it happened after two trials where someone was sentenced. A more serious miscarriage of justice, when it comes to lack of due process, is "the 363". Prosecutor General Maroš Žilinka and his heavy use of Section 363 of the Criminal Code that allows him to cancel indictments for any reason mean that all the big fish are safe. Fico, Kaliňák and many others had their corruption indictments swept away and it's hard to see what else can be done.

- Fico's whining about NATO's smear campaign against him (lol) are worrying, but he has a history of making outrageous populist statements and outright conspiracy theories about Roma, migrants, EU etc without following up on them. The main anti-NATO parties (Smer, Republika, SNS) add up to about 30% in the polls and they'd need to govern with one or both of Hlas and Sme rodina, both of which are clearly pro-Western and pro-Ukraine. Not that that's neccesarily a consolation - minor coalition partners in his governments weren't too assertive against him.

[Ex-Assemblyman Steelers]

Tabak will go with Republika?

[MRCVzla]

This update went under the table, Ódor' caretaker cabinet failed to gain confidence in the outgoing Parliament after OĽaNO, Sme Rodina and Hlas abstained, SaS and Demokrati (plus the single PS MP) were the only ones who support him. Anyway the government will remain until the September election.
https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1669327761905688576

The most recent AKO poll says Smer having a 2pp lead over Hlas in a potential 8-party parliament, but OĽaNO is likely running as coalition (with Nova and other civic independents) and is polling around 7% being in risk to falling in the same fate as PS-SPOLU in 2020 (good news to get rid Matovic, i guess?), also to watch a rise in SNS polling being closer to the 5% basic threshold.

[Estrella]

Zuzana Čaputová announced she won't be running for reelection next year. It's kind of sad, but an understandable decision. Despite, or rather because of her approval ratings (around 50%, miles ahead of any other politician except Pellegrini) and outspokenness on human rights, she and her family have been at the receiving end of much personal abuse from politicians and the sort of people that sometimes get called dezoláti (best translated as 'deplorables'). She's was a small town lawyer before entering politics and her family isn't used to publicity and being surrounded by bodyguards because of death threats. The bar is not very high, but IMO she's the best president Slovakia ever had.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

It is a shame but you can't blame her really.

[Lord Halifax]

Zuzana Čaputová announced she won't be running for reelection next year. It's kind of sad, but an understandable decision. Despite, or rather because of her approval ratings (around 50%, miles ahead of any other politician except Pellegrini) and outspokenness on human rights, she and her family have been at the receiving end of much personal abuse from politicians and the sort of people that sometimes get called dezoláti (best translated as 'deplorables'). She's was a small town lawyer before entering politics and her family isn't used to publicity and being surrounded by bodyguards because of death threats. The bar is not very high, but IMO she's the best president Slovakia ever had.

she has been mentioned as a possible NATO SG (if they want an woman from "Eastern" Europe that's more diplomatic and less confrontational than Kaja Kallas), I assume this means she's available?