Crisis in Slovakia 2018

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article or section needs to be revised. Details should be given on the talk page. Please help to improve it , and then remove this flag.

From February 2018, there was a far-reaching political and social crisis in Slovakia . It led to the resignation of the long-time prime minister , the interior minister and the police chief of the country. A structure of organized criminal machinations by a network of politicians over the years became clear and persistent national protests contributed to the fact that the ruling party Smer-SD had to increasingly draw conclusions.

The trigger was the murder of the young journalist Ján Kuciak and his fiancée Martina Kušnirová. They were shot dead in their home by strangers in late February 2018. After his research, Kuciak had reported on corruption, embezzlement of EU funds, machinations of the Italian mafia in Slovakia and their connections in the highest government circles. All over the country people took to the streets and demanded that the murder be investigated as well as a. the resignation of the government of long-term Prime Minister Robert Fico . These were the largest demonstrations in Slovakia since the communist regime was overthrown in 1989. According to estimates, up to 30,000 people took to the streets in the capital, Bratislava , and demonstrations took place in dozens of other larger and smaller cities in the country.

background

Fico-critical cartoon in 2009

Slovakia has been a member of the European Union since 2004 ; in the same year the country became a member of NATO . Robert Fico founded his party Smer-SD in 2003 , which he described as social democratic. Fico was first elected Prime Minister in 2006 and remained in office intermittently until 2018. He was last elected in March 2016. At the time of the crisis, the country was doing well economically and foreign economists predicted that the economy would continue to grow. The majority of the population has a positive attitude towards European integration and the EU as a project.

According to Kuciak's research, four Italian families managed to divert money from state and EU subsidies. To secure their business, they had succeeded in smuggling liaisons to politicians from the social democratic ruling party and directly into the office of Prime Minister Robert Fico. This would have given them access to state secrets. Specifically, two Robert Fico employees are accused of having done business with the Slovak arm of the Italian 'Ndrangheta . They were the Secretary of the National Security Council and Ficos' personal advisor, Mária Trošková . The latter had participated reasonably successfully in the 2007 Miss Universe election. She accompanied Fico on many trips without her function being defined in detail. Slovak diplomats reported that Fico had insisted that Trošková sit in the room at important meetings, for example with other heads of state or the Central European Visegrád group . However, she did not speak to anyone.

Robert Kaliňák , who worked as Minister of the Interior until the crisis , came under public criticism because he was suspected of corruption. He is said to have covered the tax fraud of a controversial Slovak oligarch . Kaliňák himself has a stake in one of its companies.

After the double murder of Ján Kuciak and his girlfriend Martina Kušnirová, the Slovak police searched the homes of Italian business people. Kuciak had researched them for his last unfinished text. They are accused of ties to the Calabrian mafia. They are said to have specialized in tax fraud and abuse of EU subsidies in Slovakia.

Murder of Ján Kuciak and Martina Kušnirová

At the end of February 2018, the investigative journalist Jan Kuciak and his girlfriend were shot dead in his house in Veľká Mača near Trnava in western Slovakia. The perpetrators shot their two victims in the chest and head. Observers spoke of an "execution".

Kuciak had researched extensively into the fabric of corruption, embezzlement of EU funds and machinations of the Italian mafia in Slovakia. He had also reported on the many personal connections of criminal structures and the contacts up to the highest levels of government. Some of his research results were published posthumously. On March 8, 2019, prosecutors brought charges against an entrepreneur who allegedly commissioned the murders. Kuciak had written about this entrepreneur many times.

Protest movement

Memorial march for Ján Kuciak and Martina Kušnirová in Brno

From spontaneous expressions of mourning for Ján Kuciak and Martina Kušnirová throughout the country, the political demand to investigate the murder gradually developed and finally the call for the resignation of the Fico government. Since then, people have been gathering all over the country every Friday evening. Up to 65,000 demonstrators gathered in Bratislava alone.

Government crisis

After the double murder, Prime Minister Robert Fico promised to solve the case.

Marek Maďarič (Smer-SD) resigned from his post as Minister of Culture on February 28, 2018. "After the murder of a journalist, I cannot imagine remaining head of this ministry, which is also responsible for the media," he said. Maďarič had previously denounced as an internal party critic, felt and corruption in the government, as well as the close ties with the business world.

Nationwide protests against the government of Robert Fico formed and his credibility was questioned: close employees of Fico and part of his cabinet were involved in the machinations. The demonstrators demanded u. a. also the resignation of Interior Minister Robert Kaliňák . The smaller coalition partners of the Fico government , the nationalist SNS and the party of ethnic Hungarians Most-Hid ("Bridge") also called for personnel to be resolved. Most-Hid in particular promised to leave the coalition if at least Interior Minister and Fico confidante Kaliňák did not step down. The party also spoke out in favor of new elections.

The EU announced that it would investigate the background of the machinations researched by Kuciak about subsidy fraud. "We are now looking closely at the case," said EU Commissioner Günther Oettinger . Oettinger considered it possible that EU payments to the agricultural sector were "misused for criminal purposes".

The pressure increased with the nationwide protests; however, Fico was reluctant to recall his Home Secretary Robert Kalinak. As a result, the head of government has to face a vote of no confidence in the Slovak National Council on March 19 . The date was set by the Presidium of the National Council. Robert Fico came to the previously surprisingly offered his resignation on March 14, 2018. As a condition, he named, among other things, that his party Smer-SD keep the right to propose a successor. He proposed Deputy Prime Minister Peter Pellegrini as his successor.

So it was not a given that President Andrej Kiska appointed Pellegrine. This enabled the Smer-SD to avert the early new elections demanded by the protest movement for the time being; the regular election date is in spring 2020. Criter accused Fico of having succeeded in installing his previous deputy and keeping the coalition under the leadership of his party in power for the time being

Pellegrini installed Tomas Drucker as Minister of the Interior. Drucker resigned on April 15, 2018 after only three and a half weeks in office, saying he did not want to polarize the country any further.

reception

Normative aspects

The rapid resignation of ministers in Slovakia is favored by the country's political system . The fact that a vote of no confidence by a simple parliamentary majority in the National Council can force a minister to resign is also described by scholars as the cause of "latent instability" in the political system. The entire government is shaken by the overthrow of individual ministers. Just the threat of coalition partners to support a vote of no confidence can encourage other governing parties to act ahead of the curve.

Assessments

The political scientist Grigorij Mesežnikov from the Institute for Public Affairs (IVO) in Bratislava said in relation to the possible Mafia contacts of the presidential assistant Mária Trošková , it was “irresponsible in which way Fico put his personal interest above the interests of Slovakia - and towards their most important foreign policy partner, ie Germany ”. "I would not be surprised," said Mesežnikov about the scope of the affair, "if all European secret services now demand more information and accountability from Slovakia."

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Stephan Löwenstein, Vienna: Crisis in Slovakia: Like an old married couple . In: FAZ.NET . ISSN  0174-4909 ( faz.net [accessed May 31, 2018]).
  2. ↑ Foreign Office: Foreign Office - Slovakia . In: Foreign Office DE . ( Auswaertiges-amt.de [accessed on May 31, 2018]).
  3. ↑ https://www.welt.de/newsticker/news1/article190324139/Korruption-Slowakischer-Unternehmer-Kocner-wegen-Auftrags-zu-Journalistenmord-angeklagt.html
  4. ↑ https://dennikn.sk/1040891/o-com-pisal-zavrazdeny-novinar-kuciak-vedel-patrat-vo-verejnych-databazach-polovica-z-jeho-poslednych-textov-je-o-kocnerovi/
  5. ↑ Deep crisis in Slovakia - and no end in sight - derStandard.de. Accessed May 31, 2018 .
  6. ↑ Slovakia: Marek Madaric resigns as minister of culture after murdering journalists . Spiegel Online , February 28, 2017, accessed March 1, 2018.
  7. ^ Stephan Löwenstein, Vienna: Crisis in Slovakia: Like an old married couple . In: FAZ.NET . ISSN  0174-4909 ( faz.net [accessed May 31, 2018]).
  8. ^ Slovakia: Pellegrini replaces Prime Minister Fico . In: Spiegel Online . March 15, 2018 ( spiegel.de [accessed June 1, 2018]).
  9. ↑ Mafia could be behind the murder of a Slovak investigative journalist . In: sueddeutsche.de . 2018, ISSN  0174-4917 ( sueddeutsche.de [accessed on June 2, 2018]).
  10. ^ Crisis after journalist murder: Slovak head of government has to face a vote of no confidence . In: Spiegel Online . March 13, 2018 ( spiegel.de [accessed June 2, 2018]).
  11. ^ Crisis in Slovakia: Pellegrini is supposed to replace Fico . ( zdf.de [accessed on May 31, 2018]).
  12. ↑ Slovakia: The new interior minister also resigns for the murder of journalists . In: ZEIT ONLINE . ( zeit.de [accessed on May 31, 2018]).
  13. ^ Deutsche Welle (www.dw.com): Slovakia: The Model, the Mafia and Big Politics | DW | 03/12/2018. Retrieved June 1, 2018 .