Slovak Elections and Politics | Fico the Fourth 🇸🇰

[PSOL]

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 was an anti-corruption figure and a superstar before her presidential run. If this is the reason she is leaving, it’s a very weak and disappointing one, especially given her relative sky high approvals and work done as president.

[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.

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?

She'd be a great choice for all the reasons you mention, but her term actually ends only around this time next year while Stoltenberg's does this October and he doesn't want another extension, so I'm not sure if it could work out.

[Estrella]

With nominations closed and eleven weeks to go, I though I'd make an effortpost. In case there's anyone new here: I don't have the energy to describe Slovakia's political history or go into detail about the shenanigans of the previous government, but fortunately both of those things have already been done. The first page of this thread has a lengthy retelling of Slovakia's politics from the restoration of democracy to 2019 (I find the writing style a little cringe now, but I dare say it's pretty good otherwise) and the rest of the thread should provide a good background on the subsequent events (or, if nothing else, induce a lot of facepalms). I've also created some maps of the 2020 election.

As for my opinion of the outgoing gone government, I'll only repeat what I said two years ago:

A year and a half ago, Smer was spectacularly kicked out from power and a new, promising government was sworn in. What have they accomplished? Only one thing, but an important one - the arrests of corrupt functionaries, judges, cops, politicians, oligarchs and so on. Once the they were arrested, the government gloated and then, instead of fixing the court system and the police, they promptly let it descend into chaos, with branches of law enforcement repeatedly raiding each others' offices instead of doing their job. Apart from this, the only thing that anyone noticed about the governing parties was that they have been constantly at each other's throats over... pretty much any issue that appeared before them. But the opposition isn't any better, as anyone who read this thread knows - that meeting at the hunting cottage is only the tip of the iceberg.

One the one hand, parties that are little more than fronts for oligarchs who treat public finances as their personal piggybank at best and send the 'Ndrangheta after journalists at worst; on the other, a neverending display of incompetence, callousness, arrogance and an absolute lack of self-awareness that seems tailor-made to alienate every remaining sympathetic voter; in between, Tiso-worshipping literal Nazis. I don't think anything sums up the quiet political crisis enveloping this country as well as this very HIGH ENERGY editorial from a newspaper that is usually the pinnacle of Very Serious #elitist liberal-conservative journalism.

Today in Slovakia, there isn't a single thing that works. No group in Slovakia is as incompetent and indifferent as you, politicians. Today, Slovakia is a country on its knees, not becuase of its citizens, even though sometime someone will have to think about why we keep voting for the greatest evil again and again as if we were high, why we are able to consume childish slogans instead of kicking all those demented posters and billboards to pieces and giving them to you as a reward for destroying the country, the public space, for your language that keeps us in a state of a cold civil war.

When Kuciak was murdered, there was a similar feeling of the country being on its knees. Perhaps it was even worse, but there was hope. And now, there isn't.

</rant>

Anyway, let's move on. Apologies if this focuses a little too much on the ridiculous.

Slovakia's National Council has 150 members elected in a single nationwide constituency by proportional representation by a form of D'Hondt method. The threshold is 5% for parties, 7% for coalitions of two or three parties and 10% for coalitions of four or more. Party lists are open: voters can give a "preference vote" to up to four candidates and the candidates with most preferences win the party's seats. There will be 25 lists with 2728 candidates running.

Parties certain to enter parliament

Direction – Social Democracy (Smer-SD) polling 18–20%
Founded in 1999 as a splinter of the post-communist SDĽ and led for its entire existence by Robert Fico, an acerbic and vulgar populist but at the same time a relatively competent administrator who carried out important reforms and led Slovakia into Schengen and Eurozone. Smer ruled the country for three terms totalling twelve years, peaking in 2012 when it triumphantly ousted the hapless Radičová government and won an absolute majority. It was all downhill from there: one outrageous corruption scandal after another made the party hemorrhage support left and right. In 2018, the murder of investigative journalist Ján Kuciak sparked the largest wave of protests since the Revolution and forced Fico to resign. After a landslide defeat in 2020 the party was left for dead, but incompetence of the government and uninspiredness of the opposition gave Fico an opportunity to come back. Smer is primarily a nationalist, populist, socially conservative and increasingly anti-EU party whose leftism consists mostly of promising more social programs and increasing pensions. They did delives on those issues (Slovakia has the lowest inequality in the OECD!), but Fico's campaign this year consist mostly of scaremongering about LGBT and gender ideology, harsh criticism of EU and NATO plus some vague and uncommital economic populism.

Voice – Social Democracy (Hlas-SD) polling 14–20%
Peter Pellegrini took over as PM when Fico was forced to resign in 2018. He was clearly much more popular than Fico (it was his face that appeared on Smer posters ahead of the last election and it was him who saved Smer from an even worse result), but Fico didn't allow him to take over the leadership. Pellegrini went on to form his own party, a hilariously shameless copycat of Smer that didn't really have any ideas besides being Smer without Fico. The two parties cooperated on collecting signatures for this or that petition criticizing government policy and all seemed well, until Smer overtook Hlas in the polls and Russia invaded Ukraine. Hlas is now running on a very vague reduce-the-cost-of-living platform, which, er, sounds the same as Smer, except that 1) Pellegrini is very pro-EU and pro-NATO, 2) he's completely silent about social issues, 3) he's personally popular (unlike Fico) but not a good campaigner (unlike Fico).

Progressive Slovakia (PS) polling 11–15%
PS was founded in 2017 as a centrist, liberal, socially progressive and pro-European party. Until then, Slovakia lacked such an option: anti-Smer parties were inspired by Christian democracy or shameless populism while SaS is euroskeptic and focused on lower taxes above all else. Formed an electoral coalition with the liberal-conservative Spolu (explained here). A large section of the public was clearly hungry for what they were offering and PS went from strength to strength. Their candidate Zuzana Čaputová was elected President, the coalition won the European election and emerged as the first clear challenge to Smer's dominance in over a decade. In the end, however, they led an overconfident and out of touch campaign, failed to clear the 7% coalition threshold by literally 926 votes (!) and were locked out of parliament. That might have been a blessing in disguise: nobody paid attention to the infighting that followed and they stayed out of the Matovič/Heger mess. PS is now led by journalist and foreign policy lecturer Michal Šimečka, who leads an upbeat campaign focusing on "decency in government", environmentalism, modernizing the education system, gender equality (the party list alternates between men and women) and such.

Republic (Republika) polling 7–9%
A splinter of the neo-Nazi ĽSNS that carefully cultivates the image of a nationalist, anti-EU/NATO, religious conservative and socially concerned party without any of that Hitler nonsense, thank you very much. This strategy seems reasonably successful, helped by the fact they're led by the clean-cut, fairly intelligent MEP Milan Uhrík, a contrast to the increasingly deranged ĽSNS which has always had the image of a bunch of uncultured thugs. The party, however, still faces much criticism for the barely-hidden Nazi pasts of many of its leading members and and are widely suspected of being "skinheads in suits". Fun fact: legally Republika isn't a new party, but a renamed HZD, the party of two-time president Ivan Gašparovič.

[Estrella]

Parties that might or might not make it

Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) polling 5–8%
Founded in 2008 as a "sane" libertarian party by awkward nerdy economist Richard Sulík, who is their undisputed leader to this day. Focused on liberalism, both economic (flat tax, cut welfare benefits to "one warm meal a day") and social (registered partnerships, decriminalize weed), plus calling referenda about random populist bullshxt. They won 12% in their first election and entered the Radičová government. Even though their voters are mostly middle/upper class Bratislavans, so obviously very pro-EU, Sulík himself is an euroskeptic who made SaS join ECR. When Radičová declared the vote on the European Stability Mechanism a vote of confidence, SaS voted against and the government fell – to Sulík's inexplicable surprise. After eight years in the wilderness, SaS entered government again in 2020. By then they have significantly moderated on economics and were content with reforming the laws around small businesses and such things, but Sulík and Matovič were at each other's throats all the time. The latter's resignation didn't calm the situation and SaS finally left the coalition in 2022. At the time they were by far the most popular coalition party with 15% in the polls, but instead of helping them rise even more, their exit made them crash to barely above the threshold. Out of desperation they called a no confidence vote and... anyway, that's why we're having an early election.

We Are Family (Sme rodina) polling 5–8%
Founded in 2015 by Boris Kollár, a millionaire businessman with a shady history, the father 12 children with 10 women and current speaker of the parliament. He explicitly calls himself "far-right" and runs on an anti-immigrant and socially conservative platform, albeit without mentioning religion: the party's slogan in this election is "we are family, we are normal". He even got Le Pen and Salvini to endorse him and addressed a Lega rally in Milan. Ironically, right now they're arguably the most economically left-wing party in Slovak politics. Kollár's big promise in the last election was building thousands of units of social housing. The houses are indeed being built and now Sme rodina is calling for more state involvement in the food industry to lower prices, buying up houses of people who defaulted on their mortgage to prevent repossession and some kind of state-run data system (from their platform: "in smart countries like Norway the state protects the oil wealth, data is the oil of 21st century"). Even more ironically, during the coalition civil wars Kollár often acted as the voice of reason and often came off as the only person actually interested in governing rather than fighting. Another thing that distinguishes Sme rodina from other nationalist-populist parties is their strongly pro-Ukraine position: Kollár supported weapons deliveries, criticized Orbán for his closeness to Putin and recently said that "we should be thankful to Ukrainians for fighting for us".

Ordinary People and Friends (OĽANO) polling 5–8%
The living embodiment of How to Win Friends and Influence People. Igor Matovič, a slightly eccentric businessman who built up a successful chain of local newspapers, entered parliament in 2010 on the SaS list. Before long he left SaS and founded Ordinary People and Independent Personalities, a party with a vaguely conservative, anti-corruption and pro-European outlook. OĽANO became (in)famous for its publicity stunts: parking a tank in front of the home of a communist politician who supported the 1968 Soviet invasion or parliamentary insanity like this. This got Matovič a solid 5–10% base of support, but made everyone else think of him as an untrustworthy clown. In the weeks before the 2020 election, when it was clear that everyone wanted Smer gone but there was no clear alternative, Matovič came up with another stunt: he went to Cannes, found the €3.2 million villa belonging to Smer finance minister Ján Počiatek and put up a sign on the gate saying "Property of the Slovak Republic". OĽANO shot up in polls from 10% to 25%, won the election and formed a government with SaS, Sme rodina and Za ľudí. What happened next is too complicated to sum up, but basically it quickly emerged that Matovič actually is an untrustworthy clown and he was forced to resign as PM in 2021 after alienating all of his coalition partners. He was replaced by fellow OĽANO member Eduard Heger, whom he kept insulting so much that he left OĽANO along with fifteen othen MPs and every minister bar Matovič himself. OĽANO is now contesting the election as a coalition (hence the "and friends"), which is a brave decision considering they're polling right around the 7% coalition threshold. Their partners are Christian Union (hardcore social conservatives led by legislation-spamming anti-abortion MP Anna Záborská) and the corpse of Za ľudí (lmao).

Christian Democratic Movement (KDH) polling 5–7%
Founded in 1990, participated in government for a total of 13 years, the longest of any party in Slovakia. They narrowly failed to enter parliament in the last two elections, but retain a lot of strength in local government, especially in northern and eastern Slovakia. Notable for being very socially conservative, even by Slovak standards: they were the driving force behind the constitutional ban on same-sex marriage and the 2015 referendum. Now they're running on a fairly leftish platform promising cheaper utilities, an excess profits tax on supermarkets , more money for families and pensioners, plus the usual social conservative stuff. Otherwise the party is pro-EU and generally anti-Smer. Somewhat notable for being, alongside the old SMK, the only party that has tended to be driven by the organization rather than the leader.

Slovak National Party (SNS) polling 3–6%
Sadly, the goldmine of a Wikiquote page for Ján Slota (SNS leader 1994–1999, 2003–2012) hasn't been translated to English. But here are some Slotisms that are remembered to this day:
– "Of course I drink, I'm not a teetotaler, I'm not impotent, I'm a normal Slovak"
– "Let them lie down into a sewer and be flushed into the deepest sh/t" – to people who didn't vote for him as mayor of Žilina
– "If they were at least beautiful. But those ugly ones, often Gypsies, who can infect hard-working Slovak drivers..." – about prostitutes
– "Back in 1248, one Frankish bishop visited the Carpathian basin, and he didn't understand how God could give such a beautiful country to such ugly people. He meant old Hungarians, because they were mongoloid types with crooked legs and disgusting horses. Small horses, even."
– "We'll fight for our territory, and we won't give a square centimetre to those f/cking Hungarians! We'll get into tanks and destroy Budapest!"

The party of our own Vladimir Zhirinovsky participated in government with Smer and HZDS in 2006–2010. However, Slota's very extensive list of scandals and criminal prosecutions was eventually too much even for his own party, and he was replaced by Andrej Danko. While Danko isn't as fond of alcohol as his predecessor, he compensates this by imitating George W. Bush:
– "I never use paper when I read"
– "The responsibility of politicians is to swallow"
– "No human can give as much love to a human as only a human can give to a human. But no other human can give as much evil, humiliation and insults, that is given only to us, humans."

Despite his, er, rhetorical handicap, Danko was a fairly popular leader. SNS entered the Fico III government and briefly jumped to 15% and second place in the polls, but it all came crashing down in summer 2017. In a misguided attempt to look like he's getting something out of Fico, Danko almost broke up the coalition for very unclear reasons and was humiliated into backing down. A deluge of scandals followed (among others, his plagiarized thesis and his military rank of captain, awarded thanks to nepotism, which gave us this infamous photo of Danko kissing his captain's insignia on a press conference). Captain Danko, as he was widely mocked, became a national laughingstock and in 2020 SNS failed to reenter parliament. He still stayed on as party leader and currently has a small chance to lead SNS back to parliament. SNS ideology is... well, under Slota it was all about Hungarians and "Gypsies", in the early Danko era they switched to scaremongering about Muslims and now the Captain promises to "fight liberalism" and calls Putin "a friend of Slovakia".

Alliance (Szövetség/Aliancia) polling 3–4%
About 8% of Slovak population are ethnic Hungarians, forming a majority on the Rye Island southeast of Bratislava and in a narrow strip along the border with Hungary. In 1994, a number of smaller parties merged to form the Party of the Hungarian Coalition, SMK–MKP. It usually won 10–12% of the vote thanks to the almost unanimous support and high turnout among the Hungarian community, the latter perhaps motivated by the aforementioned Mr. Slota. It participated in both Dzurinda governments, but after the leader and many members left to form Most-Híd, it failed to enter parliament in three straight elections despite retaining some strength in local government. Ahead of 2020 they created the Hungarian Community Unity (MKÖ–MKS), which again failed to enter parliament. MKÖ then joined with Most-Híd and formed the Alliance. Most-Híd then left when Alliance accepted a pro-Russia and anti-LGBT ex-OĽANO MP, so it's just ex-SMK and friends now. When it comes to policy, SMK was never interested in separatism or even autonomism: their platform was basically "moderate conservatism but in Hungarian". After the Most-Híd split, though, they drifted closer to Orbán and became "Fidesz but in Slovakia". It doesn't seem to be a particularly successful strategy, but I'm guessing daddy Viktor gives them an, er, reward from time to time.

Democrats (Demokrati) polling 2–5%
A flop. Created in March of this year by then-PM Eduard Heger and all other OĽANO ministers when Matovič went too nuts even for them, joined by a dozen or so more liberal OĽANO MPs around Ján Budaj (a very interesting person), plus the remains of Spolu. Heger, Budaj, Naď, Káčer, Letanovská and many other members are well-known figures, held important offices and are even reasonably popular, and yet the party is stuck below the threshold. In a demonstration of his political skills, Heger basically forced the president to fire him when he went on public TV and gave a very partisan speech to the nation about how the president can't fire him. Liberal-conservative and pro-EU, not that anybody cares.

Parties that have no chance

Kotlebists – People's Party Our Slovakia (ĽSNS) polling 1–3%
Nazis. As in marching in uniforms, praising Jozef Tiso, putting up Happy Merchant graffiti, telling people to go read Protocols of the Elders of Zion and giving out charity cheques for €1488. In 2013, their leader Marian Kotleba was shockingly elected governor of Banská Bystrica region and in 2016 they entered parliament. They fell apart in 2021 when Kotleba changed the party statutes to prevent anyone from removing him from the leadership. Half of their caucus left to found Republika and the only people left now, in terms of both MPs and voters, are the true believers in our dearest Führer.

The Blues – Bridge (Modrí–Most-Híd) polling 1–2%
Most-Híd was founded in 2009 by former SMK leader Béla Bugár, ostensibly to promote interethnic cooperation and modern liberal conservatism. In its first election it succeeded at winning over some liberal Slovak voters in Bratislava, but their participation in government – first the Radičová disaster in 2010-2012 and then the Fico III disaster in 2016-2018 – made them lose their credibility to the point that they failed to reenter parliament and their voter base now consists of 1) about one third of Hungarians on Rye Island, 2) everyone in a few random villages around Tornaľa and Trebišov, 3) some Rusyns in Eastern Carpathians. Until a month ago Most-Híd was a part of the Alliance. The Blues are the personal vehicle of ex-PM Mikuláš Dzurinda who suffers from the delusion that someone still wants him in politics.

Hungarian Forum – Civic Democrats – For the Regions – Romani Coalition – Democratic Party polling 1–2%
A Most-Híd splinter led by a former minister who disagreed with entering a coalition with Smer + a Spolu splinter led by a retired general who unsuccessfully challenged the incumbent leader + irrelevant nobodies + irrelevant nobodies + a sad attempt at reviving the old Democratic Party that dominated Slovak politics in the brief period between the end of WWII and the Communist coup.

Communist Party of Slovakia – actual quote from their website: "these cases reveal the closeness of liberalism and Nazism [...] which we can see in Ukraine, where the love for Nazi butcher Bandera and LGBT was declared official state policy".

Principle – according to Wikipedia, it was previously called "Party of the Romani Union of Slovakia", then "Sports for Košice and the East" and then "Moral Principle of Slovakia". Also, the previous leadership was allegedly close to Calabrese mafioso Antonino Vadala whose organization carried out the murder of Ján Kuciak.

Pirate Party – Slovakia – irrelevant but has some really weird organizational history.

#WeSlovakia – a "political startup" that promises to offer an app where you can vote on their policies. Yuck.

Slovak Movement of Renewal – religious, nationalist and pro-Russian conservatives who make a big deal of charity projects involving cleaning up trash, giving sweets to poor families for Christmas and such.

Patriotic Bloc – have a webpage full of Russian propaganda and spelling mistakes.

Karma – single issue anti-corruption party founded by a businessman who was wrongfully imprisoned due to the decision of a judge who a decade later became a Smer junior minister and is now in deep legal trouble herself.

Justice – the successor to 99%, a left-wing populist party last relevant a decade ago, remembered for faking signatures on their nominating petition.

Heart - Patriots and Pensioners - Slovak National Unity - existed since 1991 when the founder was expelled from SNS for advocating separatism (hilariously, SNS were briefly Czechoslovak federalists). Never won more than 0.15%, currently led by a former ĽSNS member.

Together Citizens of Slovakia – legally a successor to defunct far-left Vzdor, promises conservative-sounding but otherwise extremely trite bullshxt.

Slovak Democratic and Christian Union (SDKÚ) – hahahaha. Back in its days of glory it was the party of Mikuláš Dzurinda and Iveta Radičová, Prime Ministers for three terms totalling ten years. Only barely entered Parliament in 2012 and imploded over the course of the term: 10 out of 11 MPs left the party, the corpse won 0.26% in 2016 and didn't run in 2020. This time SDKÚ somehow managed to stand 11 candidates despite the fact it claims to have *checks notes* 4 members (3 of which are in the executive committee), €8,000 in assets and over €300,000 in liabilities. I love these guys.

Vladimír Mečiar, who was calling up mayors some months ago trying to drum up support, is thankfully not running after all. Neither is the Baron von VAT.

[PSOL]

What are socialisti.k doing?

[Estrella]

What are socialisti.k doing?

The founder Eduard Chmelár resigned after the last election, in which they won 0.55%. Their new leader is Artur Bekmatov, a doctor of philosophy, contributor to the heavily conspiratorial far-right magazine Zem a vek (think Inforwars in paper form) and until 2019 a member of the Communist Party of Slovakia and its central committee. I wouldn't call these people tankies, they aren't doctrinaire enough for that, but they're obsessed with the past to the point of parody. Every other post on their webpage mentions the Red Army in some way: lighting candles at a memorial, a hike to the site of a WW2 battle, laying a wreath at a memorial, "barbarian" activists want to remove a memorial... you get the point. They're also, of course, deeply stuck in the 1970s when it comes to foreign policy: "China has a legitimate claim to the bastion of reactionary Kuomintang" etc. Bekmatov wrote an article for the aforementioned magazine about "extremely confrontational Zelensky supporters who raped a Soviet war memorial" (translation: put up anti-Putin posters on the staircase up to it).

On other issues they're closer to typical Western European progressives than to Slovak left: they support LGBT rights and oppose nationalism (they even wrote an article about pan-Slavism and their skepticism of it, which feels like being stuck in 1850 rather than 1950 for a change). On economy, they mostly post nostalgic articles about Workers' Day and correct but not particularly inspiring criticisms of corruption and various reforms.

Last year Bekmatov ran for the governor of Nitra Region, finishing second-to-last with 1.6%. This year he apparently managed to talk Fico into giving him the 150th spot on the Smer list, which pretty much guarantees he'll be elected, since a lot of people like to give a preference vote to the last person on the list. If you ask me, this is very telling: Smer has no left-wing policies other than a very vague "let's reduce the cost of living" (which every other party also promises) and increasingly focuses only on social conservatism and nationalism. The only thing Socialists and Smer agree on is "muh West bad".

[Estrella]

Mostly written for myself to wrap my head around the chaos of the last three years, but sharing it here anyway. A (hopefully complete) list of all party switches in this Parliament, skipping over the serial switchers and just listing all MPs who are now sitting for a different party than they were elected for.

• 11 left Smer for Hlas (Pellegrini, Raši, Saková, Tomáš, Žiga, Eštok, Laššáková, Kmec, Puci, Ferenčák, Blcháč)
• 7 left Za ľudí for SaS (Ledecký, Marcinková, Kolíková, Benčík, Hattas, Lehotský, Antal)
• 3 left Za ľudí for Democrats (Žitňanská, M. Kollár, Šeliga)
• 1 left Za ľudí for PS (Valášek)
• 15 left OĽANO for Democrats (Budaj, Naď, Heger, Remiášová, Mikovský, Čekovský, Ňarjaš, Šíbl, Kozelová, Mierna, Vaňová, Halák, Krošlák, Stančík, Čepček)
• 2 left Sme rodina to become independents (Linhart, Borguľa)
• 4 left or were expelled from OĽANO to become independents (Hatráková, Tabák, Čepček, Gyimesi)
• 1 left OĽANO for SaS (Krúpa)
• 5 left ĽSNS for Republika (Mazurek, Suja, Ďurica, Urban, Kočiš)
• 3 left ĽSNS for Život (Taraba, Š. Kuffa, F. Kuffa)
• 1 left ĽSNS for Sme rodina (Šimko)
• 1 left ĽSNS to become independent (Vorobelová)
• 1 left SaS to become independent (Klus)

Which means that 55 MPs, or 37% of the Parliament have switched parties over the course of this term, in a proportional representation system where people vote for parties, not people, and where you have to stand on a party list to get elected. Democracy, huh.

[RGM2609]

Genuine question: is Matovic realizing he doesn't like politics anymore and trying to get himself kicked out of Parliament?

[DavidB.]

What is the most likely coalition after the election? I don't see any logical combination, other than, perhaps, Smer, Republika and Sme Rodina?

[Estrella]

Genuine question: is Matovic realizing he doesn't like politics anymore and trying to get himself kicked out of Parliament?

I don't know, the man has made so many insane decisions over the course of his career that he might genuinely be thinking this is somehow going to help him. But you might be right, because they didn't actually have to run as a coalition: in fact, they're the only coalition running. All other "coalitions" are just individual parties that allow members of other parties to stand on their list. The weirdest thing is that Matovič is doing this too. The official name of the coalition's list is this:



Coalition of parties OĽANO and Friends: Ordinary People (OĽANO), Independent Candidates (NEKA), Nova, Free and Responsible, Pačivale Roma, Hungarian Hearts and Christian Union and For the People

The five parties mentioned after OĽANO are all running on the OĽANO list. I have no idea why KÚ and Za ľudí couldn't do it too.

What is the most likely coalition after the election? I don't see any logical combination, other than, perhaps, Smer, Republika and Sme Rodina?

That coalition would make the most sense and it's what I expect we'll end up with, likely with the addition of Hlas (79 seats isn't a workable majority in Slovakia, and if one or both of OĽANO/SaS gets in, they down to low 70s or high 60s) and perhaps with Republika or Sme rodina replaced by SNS if they get in. There are some stumbling blocks though: Sme rodina sometimes says they'd work with Smer and sometimes that they wouldn't, while relations between Smer and Hlas are seemingly getting worse with every passing week. Back in June Pellegrini ruled out all cooperation with Republika and said that "Smer would team up with the devil himself to get back in power". That doesn't necessarily mean such a coalition won't happen, after all our politicians just love doing a 180° on their promises the day after the election.

The alternative would be a coalition of PS, Hlas, SaS, KDH and/or Sme rodina. Which is a much less ideologically compatible combination with social liberals in PS, social conservatives in KDH, economic leftists in Hlas, economic rightists in SaS and populist nationalists in Sme rodina. Pellegrini has ruled it out, but again, that doesn't necessarily mean much. I guess it could happen if Smer/Republika/SNS come up with demands that Hlas or Sme rodina see as beyond the pale, but I wouldn't put much money on it.

[RGM2609]

Thanks for your reply! On the coalition thing, if Hlas were to come in second after Smer, wouldn't they rather try to form some sort of Frankenstein alliance so Pellegrini becomes PM rather than be stuck as Fico's "partners"?

[Estrella]

Thanks for your reply! On the coalition thing, if Hlas were to come in second after Smer, wouldn't they rather try to form some sort of Frankenstein alliance so Pellegrini becomes PM rather than be stuck as Fico's "partners"?

I think it's going to depend on whether Fico and Pellegrini patch up their relations or if they keep getting worse. I'm sure Pelle would like to be the bigger fish, even if he wasn't PM - Šimečka would be much more accomodating than Fico. But a PS+Hlas+SaS+KDH+? coalition would be very difficult to keep together. The threshold is also going to do much to determine which coalition gets better numbers. SaS and KDH in, OĽANO and SNS out would make some sort of an anti-Smer arrangement a lot more likely.

[Estrella]

Unfortunately I'm too busy with other things to be able to write more about the campaign, but if nothing else, here's the average of all July polls:



It's ridiculous to talk about polarization when the top two parties get barely 35% together, but still. Hlas was overtaken first by Smer, which now has a clear lead in all polls, and then by PS for second place. SNS keeps inching closer to the threshold, while Sme rodina, KDH and SaS are all just a stiff breeze away from falling out of parliament. Even though Pellegrini's dream of a triumphant return as PM is dead, Hlas is still needed for any kind of plausible coalition. The seat numbers would be Smer 40, PS 31, Hlas 26, Republika 17, Sme rodina 12, KDH 12, SaS 12. That gives us these possible combinations:

Smer+Hlas+Republika+Sme rodina = 95
PS+Hlas+Sme rodina+KDH+SaS = 93
Smer+Hlas+Republika = 83
PS+Hlas+KDH+SaS = 81
Smer+Hlas+Sme rodina = 78

[Storr]

Confirmation that no one in Slovakia smiles:

https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1686351217381736448?s=20

[Estrella]

Confirmation that no one in Slovakia smiles:

https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1686351217381736448?s=20

[Estrella]

I swear I'm not procrastinating.

[Estrella]

I'm up to my neck in personal and family stuff I need to deal with, so I'm not able to cover this nearly as much as I wanted to. I did try to make sense of this campaign and made a very rough political compass, based on each party's important-seeming or emphasized campaign issues, as listed below.

Smer: "intelligent regulation of the economy", "equal protection of both entrepreneurship and the welfare state", excess profits tax, crack down on tax evasion, "I will not support the homosexual agenda", "for us the spiritual needs of the Slovak nation are more important than the physical needs of homosexuals", stop weapon shipments to Ukraine, Ukraine should be "a buffer between Russia and NATO", criticizing other politicians for being insufficiently patriotic, e.g. not taking part in the celebration of the anniversary of the meeting that codified the written Slovak language.

PS: "a dignified future for all", "make Slovakia a promised land for entrepreneurial people", cut taxes and regulations, few concrete proposals on the economy but generally centre-right-ish in tone, a modern and inclusive education system, "a democratic and pro-Western future", improve acess to mental health services, end unpaid internships, "a circular economy instead of a waste economy", cut emissions to 40% of 1993 levels by 2030, free period products in schools, registered partnerships for same-sex couples.

Hlas: a lot of super vague moderate heroism with basically no concrete proposals but sliiightly to the left in tone, "a strong state that will help people", build three new hospitals, help young people and pensioners, pro-EU/NATO, not a peep about social issues.

Republika: "stop funding LGBT and Soros NGOs" and "not a cent to NGOs!" (the latter being the line on most of their posters), single-payer healthcare, "greater freedom in vaccination", simplify business regulations, decrease income taxes and increase consumption taxes, "make sure work pays more than welfare", "the war in Ukraine was caused by the West", "defend our national values in the cultural-ideological battle with progressivism".

OĽANO: their entire campaign consists of huge billboards with "we won't sell you out to mafia" and (I swear I'm not making this up) a cross between a lottery and an MLM that gives you the opportunity to win rent a Fiat 500 or at least a t-shirt. Having said that, in the past Matovič was basically a run of the mill moderate conservative (his general clownishness notwithstanding) and they prominently display the EPP logo on the header of their website, which is why I put them where they are.

Sme rodina: "we are family, we are normal", "we aren't perfect but we can help" and other such feelgood stuff, create a state-owned grocery store chain with subsidized prices, build social housing with subsidized rents, a plan to "make Slovakia the technological tiger of Europe" (by, among other things, creating some kind of state-owned database), "we know there are only two genders".

KDH: simplify business regulations, excess profits tax for supermarkets, hire more nurses, increase wages in social care by 50%, up to €6000 per year for single parents, an extra day of holiday every month for mothers of children under 15, a fairly detailed plan to protect the environment and biodiversity, ban the abortion pill, allow abortions to take place only during the 5th and 6th week of pregnancy (they supported a total ban until 2020 and several times attempted to get the courts to declare abortion unconstitutional or legislate for a total ban in the constitution), a few years ago led the successful constitutional ban on same-sex marriage, oppose registered partnerships for same-sex couples (obviously) but also unregistered cohabitation or any kind of procedure to enable them to access to medical documentation, inheritance etc. Unlike other parties with similar positions on social issues they're very anti-Smer, pro-EU and pro-Ukraine.

SaS: 19% flat tax, simplify business regulations, fiscal decentralization by increasing municipal taxes, increase competition between railway operators and between health insurance companies, end the mandatory shop closing on holidays, "a more flexible labor law", legalize medical marijuana, introduce registered partnerships, build a new nuclear power plant, support admitting Ukraine and Georgia to EU and NATO.

SNS: "together we'll stop price increases", "together we'll stop liberalism", stop weapon shipments to Ukraine, "LGBT rights aren't basic human rights", otherwise even more vague than Hlas.

Demokrati: The same as Hlas, vague noncommittal bullshxt except with a centre-right rathern than centre-left lean. Btw they seem to have realized that everyone hates Heger and while he remains party leader, the "electoral leader" will be Andrea Letanovská, a doctor and briefly a Za ľudí MP.

Szövetség: not shown on the chart because pretty much all of their platform focuses on ethnic/language issues - more Hungarian schools, bilingual road signs, more funding for Hungarian culture, a separate Catholic diocese for Hungarian-majority areas, things like that.

ĽSNS: "we will protect Slovakia from LGBT and gender" (the line on most of their posters), nationalize the energy industry, create a state-owned company to build housing for families who vow to stay in Slovakia, create a state-owned bank to take over mortages of people who had their interest rates increased to let them pay at the original rate.

Modrí-Most: "we are a modern liberal-conservative party", "we hold on to the ideas of the religious and cultural heritage of Europe and secular humanism" and other such generic centre-right talking points.

[PSOL]

Which party did the “pro-chavista” MP go to that was previously mentioned in this thread?

[Estrella]

Which party did the “pro-chavista” MP go to that was previously mentioned in this thread?

If you mean Ľuboš Blaha, he’s still in Smer, standing as no. 3 on their list. Right now he’s busy blaming America for the war in Ukraine and calling for a Russian-style ban on “spreading LGBT propaganda”.

[RGM2609]

Great post! Obviously a tricky question, but if you had to choose one, which party would you bet on being the victim of the classic Eastern European "20% polling miss"? (in either direction)

Also can foreign nationals apply for OLaNO's lottery? Could use a new t shirt!

[MaxQue]

Does the government even have any power related to dioceses?

[Estrella]

Great post! Obviously a tricky question, but if you had to choose one, which party would you bet on being the victim of the classic Eastern European "20% polling miss"? (in either direction)

Thanks! And that’s a really difficult question Every relevant party either:
— has a leader who is loved by their voters but hated by everyone else (Smer, OĽANO, SNS, the Modrí part of Modrí-Most, increasingly also Sme rodina)
— has a solid base but is seen as ideologically beyond the pale by a significant part of the population (Republika and ĽSNS, but also PS as social “ultraliberals”)
— is too tainted by their participation in the Matovič/Heger governments, universally seen as disastrous (SaS, Democrats and obviously OĽANO)
— has an interest group they appeal to but is toxic to anybody else (KDH, Szövetség and the Most part of Modrí-Most)

The only party none of this applies to is Hlas. If there’s someone I’d expect to overpoll/underpoll dramatically, it’s Pellegrini, especially with his down to earth/bland and boring (take your pick) campaign. And there’s also the caveat that a lot can happen in the two-week polling ban before the election.

Also can foreign nationals apply for OLaNO's lottery? Could use a new t shirt!

Well, firstly you need to “found your army” and “GET MORE FIGHTERS for your army”, so take that as you will

Does the government even have any power related to dioceses?

No, but I’m guessing they want the government to have a word with the nuncio. Which might seem weird, but everyone likes to act as if Roman Catholicism is Slovakia’s state religion. It’s expected of politicians to attend a Te Deum in St Martin’s Cathedral on important state occasions — for example, there was one after Čaputová’s inauguration to bless her presidency. Priests are paid directly by the government, though this applies to all churches with at least 50,000 members and we aren’t talking about too much money — an archbishop gets less than €800 per month. Slovakia doesn’t even technically have a separation of church and state: according to an agreement signed with the Vatican in 2000, the government is obligated to fund the Roman Catholic church. It’s an official international treaty and there’s no termination clause, so… yeah.

On the previous page I mentioned that KDH has participated in government longer than any other party. This is one of the consequences. KDH is specifically a Roman Catholic party and they’re openly supported by RC clergy, to the point that those little noticeboards in front of churches often display KDH posters. This is all that more ridiculous because Slovakia isn’t Poland: in addition to the 31% that are irreligious, there are 300,000 Lutherans, 200,000 Greek Catholics, 100,000 Eastern Orthodox and 50,000 Calvinists in Slovakia (and in a country of five million, that’s quite a lot).

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Also can foreign nationals apply for OLaNO's lottery? Could use a new t shirt!

Well, firstly you need to “found your army” and “GET MORE FIGHTERS for your army”, so take that as you will

This is beyond amazing. Matovic is going out in a blaze of parody. Are you signed up for a T-shirt? 

[Estrella]

Destruction cometh; and they shall seek peace, and there shall be none. Mischief shall come upon mischief, and rumour shall be upon rumour; then shall they seek a vision of the prophet; but the law shall perish from the priest, and counsel from the ancients.

The Slovak Information Service (SIS) was founded in 1993 as the domestic and foreign intelligence agency of the newly independent country. It wasn't long before the increasingly authoritarian prime minister Vladimír Mečiar turned SIS, now led by his good friend Ivan Lexa, into his personal goon squad. From 1994 to 1998, the agency served as Mečiar's most important tool in the fight against the opposition and his arch-enemy, president Michal Kováč. It started with phone tapping, surveillance of homes of MPs and searching for kompromat. Increasingly desperate, Mečiar and Lexa reached for more and more extreme measures. SIS tried to discredit an anti-Mečiar bishop, set fire to a journalist's car, physically assaulted an opposition MP and even placed a bomb in a stadium so that Mečiar could accuse the KDH leader of personally planting it before a HZDS rally (?!?). In August 1995, the president's son Michal Kováč Jr. was kidnapped, beaten up and taken to Austria, where an arrest warrant had been issued on him in a corruption case. In April 1996, Róbert Remiáš, one of the key figures in investigation of the kidnapping was assassinated by a car bomb.

You might think this made SIS a respected and feared force. The reality was the opposite: even at the height of Mečiar's power, they were a national laughingstock. As Lexa's inept friends took over the organization, disgruntled agents left and formed a so-called parallel secret service. They set out on a mission to use their insider knowledge to sabotage the agency's operations and discredit the regime. Their most impactful action was helping Oskar Fegyveres (the key witness in the Kováč Jr. kidnapping case) go into hiding abroad and save his life. But SIS didn't need any help to discredit itself: it leaked like a sieve and its funds were being diverted for everything from salaries of fictitious employees to renovating agents' private homes. The failures of their laughably amateurish operations led them to contract out much of their dirty work (including the murder of Remiáš) to the mafia. Opposition newspapers regularly published saucy and compromising details of SIS activites, from real names of agents and licence plates of cars used for surveillance to, most famously, the recording of a phone call between Lexa and Mečiar's minister of interior, remembered to this day for Lexa's phrase "if you kick him in the balls, I'll kiss you on the forehead".

After Mečiar's farcical sabotage of a referendum on introducing direct presidential elections and parliament spending eleven months trying and failing to elect a successor to Kováč, Mečiar became interim president when Kováč's term expired. He passed an amnesty on all crimes related to the sabotaged referendum, the kidnapping of Kováč Jr and the murder of Remiáš. Mečiar lost the 1998 election and never returned to power, but the amnesties meant that prosecuting those responsible was almost impossible. Ivan Lexa fled the country and even though he was arrested in 2002 (in Durban of all places), he got off scot free.

Mečiar's successors, Mikuláš Dzurinda (1998-2006) and Robert Fico (2006-2010) might not have been authoritarians, but they certainly were up to their necks in corruption. More and more scandals were coming to light: whether under Dzurinda and his shady coalition partner Pavol Rusko...

Pavol Rusko is a former Slovak politician who held the positions of leader of the Alliance of the New Citizen (ANO), Member of Parliament, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy of Slovakia. Previously, he was the CEO and co-owner of TV Markíza.

After the outbreak of a scandal concerning the promissory notes worth approximately 100 million crowns, which Rusko borrowed as minister in 2003 from the businessman Ľubomír Blaško who was doing business with his ministry, Rusko was dismissed from the post of Minister of Economy.

Since March 2018, he has been under house arrest after being accused of preparing the murder of Sylvia Volzová. On 12 January 2021, the Supreme Court upheld the verdict of the Special Criminal Court, and Rusko was sentenced along with Marián Kočner to 19 years in prison for forgery of promissory notes of TV Markíza.

... or under Fico and his shady coaltion partner Ján Slota.

- Interblue scandal [selling off Slovak emission quotas to a shell corporation at half the actual price], publicized in 2009-2010. No-one was sentenced in the case, although three ministers were removed. In a recording published in 2019, [then minister of finance] Počiatek says about Slota: "He ripped off even Fico, for fxck's sake, because he didn't give him his half, but somehow screwed it up, what a king" and [then prosecutor general] Trnka laughs.

- He was involved in the noticeboard tender scandal [the call for bids on a €120 million public procurement contract was published only on a noticeboard in a private corridor in the building of Ministry of Construction] that resulted in Marián Janušek and Igor Štefanov - two SNS ministers of construction - being sentenced to 11 and 9 years in prison.

At this point the Smer and SDKÚ scandals were thought to be bad but not earth-shattering. That changed in December 2011, just after the fall of the hapless and feuding SDKÚ-led government of Iveta Radičová. A series of recordings called Gorila was published anonymously on the internet. They contained details of conversations featuring Jaroslav Haščák (deeply corrupt head of the Penta investment group), Jirko Malchárek (Dzurinda's Minister of Economy), the chairwoman of the National Property Fund and, among many others, Robert Fico, talking about using kickbacks from manipulated privatizations to fund SDKÚ, Smer, KDH and SMK. A massive wave of protests broke out. Fico was hardly untouched by these revelation, but he wasn't hit nearly as hard as... well, pretty much everyone in the Dzurinda governments. Smer won the 2012 election in a landslide, getting a majority on its own and reducing SDKÚ to just 6%.

Vyhraj voľby, môžeš všetko. Win the election and you can do everything. Nothing characterizes the 2012-2020 Smer governments better than this quote by the then deputy party leader Pavol Paška. Fico gave in to public pressure and created the National Criminal Agency (NAKA) as an umbrella anti-corruption organization. Other than that, though... I don't have enough time to write about everything involving the Fico and Pellegrini governments, but here's a taste of what a typical Smer corruption scandal looked like:

In 2014, it was revealed that the hospital in Piešťany bought a CT scanner for an inflated price, which prompted suspicions of corruption. One of the people on the hospital's managing board was a certain Michal Straka, whose main qualification for the job is... being a musician known as Ego. Matovič played the video with Ego's response in parliament, which would not be so strange if Ego didn't segue from the talking about how amazing the new scanner is to insulting his cousin's husband, saying that he's a "cruel racist rat" who needs to die along with his "f/cked up mother" and calling his daughters whores.

Also, I only found tabloids writing about this, but Ego is apparently friends with Mikuláš Černák, a 90s mafia boss currently in jail for 20 counts of murder. Nominating this guy to a hospital board was honestly peak Smer.

Imagine eight years of this, topped off by the murder of Ján Kuciak that produced more indignation than all of the scandals put together and marked the first time since 1989 that demonstrations forced a government to resign. It's hard to overstate just how hated Smer was in the run-up to the 2020 election. The economy was doing great, unemployment was at a record low, social programs were being expanded, long-awaited reforms had been carried out, Smer was led by the second-most popular politician in the country... and yet the party was on track to get the worst result in its history. In the end it managed to scrape together 18% and second place – but as Fico himself admitted, "I can guarantee you that if we didn't pass a pension increase a week before the election, Smer gets 12 or 13 percent".

What followed next in politics – the Matovič/Heger insanity – was concerning, but it was mostly just a series of theatrical displays of egotism. What followed next in the security services was much more disturbing.

During a mega-raid yesterday, the following people were arrested and indicted for corruption, abuse of official competences and creation of a criminal group:
- František Böhm, a former member of Slovak Information Service (the national intelligence agency)
- Dušan Kováčik, a long-time boss of Office of the Special Prosecutor
- Ľudovít Makó, former boss of Criminal Office of Financial Administration
- Bernard Slobodník, a former chief of National Unit of Financial Police
- Róbert Krajmer, former director of National Anticorruption Unit
- Peter Hraško, the former chief of National Criminal Agency
- Tibor Gašpar, the former Police President

A tl;dr of the criminal conspiracy the above were part of (the parts that we know about so far, that is; there will probably be much more to it):

- Norbert Bödör and his family own several businesses*, the largest of them being Bonul, Slovakia's largest private security contractor.
- Bonul was awarded many lucrative contracts under Smer governments and Bödör is personally close to Robert Fico.
- According to information of witnesses, mostly members of police and judiciary plus several pentiti, the police, anti-corruption institutions and a number of prosecutors and judges were controlled by the Bödörs with the help of Tibor Gašpar and his accomplices.
- Among other things, Bödör gave Bernard Slobodník a €20k bribe to protect the millionaire Juraj Široký from investigation into his dubious business practices.
- Before the 2016 election, Bödör's people spied on Matovič and his then-political ally Daniel Lipšic and might have broken into Matovič's home.
- All of the people mentioned in the previous post were appointed by Fico's governments.

Vladimír Pčolinský, the new director of SIS (our equivalent of CIA, basically) gave a TV interview that mostly consisted of a long rant about Fico and his interior minister Kaliňák and accused them of gutting the agency so that they wouldn't be investigated. He had his reasons, though - apparently SIS was so disastrously underfunded and undermanned that they didn't even know that like half of top cats in Slovak police and judiciary are pals with and/or controlled by mafia. Oh, and apparently some unspecified "Chinese subjects" paid for prostitutes for several MPs. Not sure if that's the kind of thing you should just blurt out on live TV if you're the director of secret service, but whatever.

lmao, half of this thread is gonna be just lists of high-ranking officials busted for corruption

National Criminal Agency's Mills of God and Purgatory anti-corruption operations are followed by one with an even cooler name: Judas. Today, yet another former Police President was arrested, along with seven other people. According to testimonies of pentiti caught in previous operations, Milan Lučanský received €30k/month for two years from a businessman in return for axing investigations into his connections with mafia. Other people indicted in this case include a former chief of SIS counterintelligence (not Arpáš, this is another one; the list does, however, include Arpáš's wife, also a former secret agent) and a former SIS deputy director.

Also, according to other testimonies, the former Minister of Economy, now Hlas MP Peter Žiga convinced Norbert Bödör to pay €50k to police officials to stop an investigation into Žiga's nephew.

Norbert Bödör's scheme had three goals: keeping Smer in power, staffing positions in security forces with loyalists and personal financial gains - and he wasn't going to let anything stop him. In summer of 2015, Kaliňák, Bödör and other high-ranking police officers and investigators met at the Ministry of Interior in response to Matovič looking like an increasingly dangerous threat in the upcoming election. On this meeting, Bödör presented a plan for gathering kompromat on Matovič that included stalking him and bugging his phone. And it doesn't stop there: in 2017, when Fico's arch-nemesis, President Andrej Kiska, considered founding a political party, a similar meeting took place, again with a plan to gather dirt on Smer's political enemies.

And yet another bombshell came out in the megascandal that led to arrests of something like 20 people so far (not including the 13 judges prosecuted for corruption earlier this year, a case that is likely connected to this), confirming what everyone suspected:

... a web of corruption that was in high likelihood kept alive by police officers, prosecutors and judges, with significant participation of corrupt business environment, where money was the number one priority for all concerned. [...] the court finds the discoveries monstruous.

Another spicy secret that has now become public is that before the 2016 election, Norbert Bödör was trying to get his hands on a certain video recording that had the potential to discredit Fico. He also obtained listening devices from a government agency and installed them in a café owned by Milan Krajniak (current Minister of Labour, then a Sme Rodina MP) and in his own hotel, the Zlatý kľúčik.

I'm not gonna go into details, this newspaper headline tells the whole story: During an investigation of mafia within police, more than €1 million in cash was seized.

František Böhm, a former SIS secret agent, a pentito and key witness whose testimony led to the prosecution of police president Milan Lučanský, has committed suicide. Murder-suicide, actually; he shot his wife in the chest and them himself in the head.

Adding to the deluge of businessmen, high-ranking police officers, investigators, judges, lawyers, secret agents and politicians caught during the ongoing investigation into Smer-era corruption, Vladimír Pčolinský, the director of Slovak Information Service was arrested today. He is charged with taking bribes from oligarch Zoroslav Kollár (no relation to Boris) in return for stopping the wiretapping of his phones when he was being investigated for connections to mafia and bribery/intimidation of judges.

This seems to be a conflict between police trying to scuttle investigations into their own higher-ups and SIS, and the government seems to be taking the latter's side. In any case, the best description of the current state of affairs is Jesus Christ, this shouldn't be happening in an EU country.

In one of the buildings of SIS, in a special room secured against surveillance, a meeting took place, with new director of SIS Michal Aláč, President Zuzana Čaputová, Prime Minister Eduard Heger, Speaker of Parliament, Minister of Justice, Minister of Interior, Prosecutor General, Special Prosecutor, Police President and director of Inspection Office of Ministry of Interior. The meeting was initiated by the PM, who confirmed this to Denník N [a newspaper]. Heger called the meeting after he received information from SIS about manipulation of investigations.

What "manipulation of investigations" seems to refer to is police allegedly influencing wittness testimonies to avoid implicating the wrong people. The meeting came after Sme rodina alleged that the arrest of former SIS director Vladimír Pčolinský was motivated by his investigation into police corruption.

You know that mnemonic about the wives of Henry VIII? Divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived. The Slovak version would be about Police Presidents. The incumbent Peter Kovařík announced his resignation after he was accused of obstruction of justice in relation to him cancelling a raid that led to the escape of two witnesses accused of perjury in corruption cases. So that makes it, umm... ousted, ousted, jailed, jailed, killed himself, indicted and resigned.

Inspectorate of the Ministry of Interior arrested four National Criminal Agency investigators in charge of most serious corruption cases.

There's also this. Sme Rodina MP Martin Borguľa is being investigated by the National Criminal Agency for... bribing the National Criminal Agency not to investigate him - specifically giving €50,000 to the director of agency's financial unit and an investigator.

So those were the last three years - chaos and backstabbing on top of chaos and backstabbing. Last week, the security forces carried out two operations under the telling codenames Ezechiel 7 (hence the opening paragraph of this post) and Rozuzlenie ("Denouement").

They discredited, manipulated and wanted to help Gašpar. What are Pčolinský and Aláč accused of?

Covering the prosecution of the former police president and now no. 9 on the Smer list, Tibor Gašpar, or finding compromising materials against NAKA investigators or witnesses to major scandals. According to the investigators, all this was committed by those accused in operation Rozuzlenie.

Members of the alleged criminal group were charged by NAKA on Thursday, 17 August. Among the accused are former and current directors of the Slovak Information Service, Vladimír Pčolinský and Michal Aláč. The remaining three are either fugitives or, according to the police, "untraceable".

According to the police, the group was allegedly led by businessman Peter Košč, nicknamed Mr X. He has been out of Slovakia for a long time. According to the indictment, he allegedly tried to discredit the investigators around Ján Čurilla, who at the time were uncovering corruption crimes, by means of three other people who worked at NAKA, SIS or the Office of National Security. His subordinates were allegedly the aforementioned Pčolinský, the former head of NAKA operatives Ján Kaľavský, as well as the ex-SIS agent Martin Ciriak.

The Slovak Information Service helped the accused NAKA ex-policeman Ján Kaľavský not to be extradited to Slovakia. Kaľavský denounced fellow investigators around Ján Čurilla, who are investigating cases from the times of the Smer governments, but he himself has been convicted after two years of investigations for bringing out information from the investigation of these cases. He has been on the run in Bosnia and Herzegovina for two years. On Thursday last week, the NAKA indicted several current and former members of the security forces, including the director of the National Security Office, Roman Konečný.

[Estrella]

And now for something rather less dramatic: polling averages. It's three weeks since I last did this and three weeks until the polling moratorium.



On the one hand, basically no change: "others" lost 2.8%, but no party gained or lost more than one point. On the other hand, a big shakeup of the parliamentary artihmetic: SNS and OĽANO narrowly crossing their respective thresholds gives Fico another partner to pick from with the former and PS another coalition formation headache with the latter.

The National Council would look like this, with parties arranged left to right roughly based on how close to Smer and PS they are:


Smer 36 Republika 13 SNS 9 Hlas 23 Sme rodina 9 OĽANO 12 KDH 10 SaS 10 PS 28