The former Slovak Prime Minister, Robert Fico, has already secured the coalition government that will lead him to the head of the Executive for the fourth time. The leader of the Smer-SSD party has not needed the two weeks established by law and given to him by President Zuzana Aputová to gain the parliamentary majority and he will not exhaust the 30 days he has to attend the investiture session with a government program.
Fico, pro-Russian and pseudo-social democrat, has signed a coalition agreement in principle with Petr Pellegrini, leader of The Voice of the Democrats (Hlas-SD), and with Andrej Danko, leader of the SNS, which will try to be crystallized before the summit of the EU on October 26 and 27.
“Slovakia needs a new government as soon as possible,” said Pellegrini, who asked President Caputova to cooperate and convene a session of the new Parliament on the date requested by the leaders of the new government coalition.
The pact provides that Pellegrini, who succeeded Fico in office when he resigned in 2018 due to popular protests against corruption and nepotism, will be president of Parliament. Smer will hold the position of prime minister and six cabinet positions, including Justice, Defense and Foreign Affairs; The Voice will have seven, including Interior, and the SNS three.
According to the local press, the negotiations are very much on track and the list of ministers is practically closed, but it is not ruled out that the composition of the Government that Fico will present is free of controversy based on the president’s statements.
In a television program, Aputová has raised a warning finger by announcing that, when making ministerial appointments, she would have problems with the people who are currently accused in the corruption case that came to light with the murder of the journalist from investigation Jan Kuciak and his girlfriend.
One of the names circulating as possible Ministers of Defense or Interior and who could be unacceptable to the president is Robert Kaliác, although the charges against him were dropped. Another obstacle could be Ubo Blaha, the best positioned for the Foreign Affairs portfolio.
Aputová said she would not comment on hypothetical issues, “at the same time, I don’t want to imagine any black scenarios,” she said of Blaha’s possible nomination.
The Smer deputy’s response was immediate: “Madam Speaker, let me remind you of the basic facts. The parliamentary elections were won by the Smer party by a large margin, while your party, Progressive Slovakia, lost. You have no right to punish to the politicians that the people decided should win the elections,” Ubo Blaha responded in a video on Telegram.
Blaha reminded the president that the Constitution excludes the president’s subjective reasons when refusing to appoint a certain person as a member of the Government. “Unlike (Daniel) Lipic, I did not kill anyone. Nor did I steal a thesis, unlike (Igor) Matovic. My only crime is that I write scientific books and that in politics I have different opinions than his.” Lipic was elected attorney general by Matovic.
The deputy, at the head of the polls to occupy Foreign Affairs, finished his response to the president by stating that “I do not like her servile policy towards the United States nor her extreme liberal progressive opinions. I do not like that she has ruined the referendums. Nor do I I like that you lied to people saying that the Covid vaccine is freedom. I could go on. You don’t like my leftist, peaceful and patriotic opinions. It is your right, but you cannot deny the rights of politicians who “They won the election based on their subjective political opinions.”
Blaha’s opinions are a reflection of the ideology defended by Fico and Smer in the electoral campaign. Once the tripartite gets underway, they will translate into measures against immigration and against aid to Ukraine.
“There are cities and municipalities in an emergency situation in relation to immigration and the new Government plans to address the situation as soon as possible. The security of citizens is at stake and the State forces must do everything possible to guarantee it,” said the future prime minister.
In foreign policy, the base memorandum signed by the three formations guarantees diplomacy based on membership in the EU and NATO, while “respecting the interests of the nation-state of Slovakia.” That is the nuance that worries Brussels. Fico already said in the election campaign that he would not supply Ukraine with “a single shot of ammunition” and that he would resume relations with Russia.
After his electoral victory, Fico insisted: Slovakia has “bigger problems” than aid to Ukraine. One of them is budgetary stability, in a country that has one of the largest fiscal deficits in the EU, greater than 6% of GDP.
