Slovenia - Election 2022 - National Assembly and President
Slovenia will spend much of 2022 in campaign mode as voters will head to the polls three times in what has been described as a super election year. A general election was scheduled for 22 April followed by presidential, National Council and local elections in autumn. There had been mounting calls for a snap election from opposition and commentators due to the government's handling of the epidemic and its perceived undermining of the rule of law.
On 23 October 2020 Prime Minister Janez Janša endorsed US President Donald Trump's reelection, adding his name to a list of foreign leaders who had come out in support of Trump during the election campaign, including Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban. Janša tweeted that Biden would be "one of the weakest presidents in history" if elected. The opposition Social Democrats (SD) endorsed Biden. They said the world needed leaders who understood cooperation, empathy, kindness as key to progress and prosperity for everyone. "People like Joe Biden and Kamala Harris," they tweeted.
On 28 May 2021 thousands of protesters took to the streets of Ljubljana protesting against the government's actions and calling for an early election. The rally included various groups and movements and was supported by trade unions and part of the opposition. PM Janez Janša said spreading Covid-19 with unregistered mass rallies was a crime. Representatives of the country's main trade union associations, the Friday bicycle protest movement, NGOs and people from the academic and cultural circles addressed the rally to criticise what they see as problematic measures and laws by the government, highlight a lack of social dialogue and stress the need for an early election.
Slovenia is a parliamentary democracy and constitutional republic. Power is shared among a directly elected president (head of state), a prime minister (head of government), and a bicameral parliament composed of the National Assembly (lower house) and the National Council (upper house). In June 2018 the country held parliamentary elections. Observers considered the elections free and fair. Significant human rights issues included: threats of violence against journalists by nongovernment actors, and criminalization of libel and slander. In January 2020, Prime Minister Marjan Sarec resigned and in March 2020 the new government under Prime Minister Janez Jansa of the Slovenian Democratic Party was sworn in.
Local anticorruption experts said corruption in the country is systemic, however only isolated cases were investigated. Corruption manifested itself through politically motivated staffing in state-owned enterprises, conflicts of interest, bribes, and lack of transparency throughout the country’s political and economic spheres, particularly in public tenders. Due to limited police capacity, just one percent of alleged corrupt practices were investigated, and courts also had a poor track record in trying corruption cases. The "parallel mechanism of deep state" from the period of transition is still very much alive in Slovenia and that money for completely political and ideological needs keeps returning to the country.
Independent media were active and expressed a wide variety of views without restriction. Nevertheless, journalist organizations reported growing hateful rhetoric and threats against journalists online, spurred by animosity from officials. The European Commission reported in its September rule of law report for the country that concerns have been raised by stakeholders about possible politically motivated changes to the funding of the national public broadcaster and the governance of the national press agency. Media freedom watchdogs also expressed concerns about government moves to exert pressure on public broadcaster RTV through changes to its governing bodies, especially following criticism by government officials of RTV’s reporting that was unfavorable to the government.
The International Press Institute estimated that “few countries in Europe have experienced such a swift downturn in press and media freedom after a new government came to power,” leading to “a worrying decline in press freedom in a very short space of time in a country previously considered a relative safe haven for independent journalism, sending up further warning signs about deteriorating media freedom in Central Europe.”
Watchdog groups’ concerns about alleged financing of certain Slovenian media outlets by sources tied to Hungary’s ruling Fidesz party increased on 30 September 2020, when Telekom Slovenije sold Planet TV to Hungary’s TV2 Media, owned by Jozsef Vida, reportedly linked to the business network of Fidesz. Two Slovenian media outlets associated with the Slovenian Democratic Party, weekly newspaper Demokracija and the NovaTV web portal and TV channel, have long been rumored to receive funding from Fidesz allies.
After the 2018 parliamentary elections, a minority government headed by Marjan Šarec (LMŠ) was established. Šarec made a strategic mistake when on 27 January 2020 he stepped down from the position of the president of the government. He calculated that his resignation could lead to early parliamentary elections, after which he would once again come to the position of the president of the government. Such a reckless move enabled Janez Janša (SDS) to come to power and form a right-center government, together with the Modern Centre Party /Stranka modernega centra/ (now Concretely /Konkretno/), New Slovenia /Nova Slovenija/ (NSi) and Party of Pensioners /Stranka upokojencev DeSUS/.
At the very beginning of the mandate, Janša's government faced the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic and attributed its unreadiness to cope with the pandemic the government to Šarec's government. Slovenia undertook rigorous measures in the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic. However, the majority of the measures proved to be excessive, some even unnecessary, while many were illegal and unconstitutional. Furthermore, questionable and dubious spending, that was a misuse of public money was also recorded during the pandemic.
Despite the promises made that the government would unify the citizens and the announcements that the coalition parties will act as a corrective to the government headed by Janez Janša and his Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS), the practice was completely different. Janez Janša is regarded as an ally and satellite of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban (Fidesz), who is Putin's key satellite in the European Union and NATO. This connection quickly became evident on the Slovenian political scene, particularly through the actions undertaken by Janša's government and creation of an atmosphere in the society that had earlier also been typical of Janša's rule. Analysts believe that this needs to be understood in the context of the fact that Budapest had become a center of “The Internationale of Crime”, while key actors in these financial (Russian) transactions have been identified as “Putinians”.
A period of divisions and radicalization of the Slovenian society, establishment of Orban's model of rule and introduction of some different and alleged European values into the Slovenian social space began. The suitable and obedient, but inexperienced, got appointed to positions. Pressure was put on the judiciary, while appointment of EU-delegated prosecutors was avoided. Pressuring and subordination of the media also became evident (most prominent cases include the RTV Slovenia broadcaster and the Slovenian News Agency - STA), as well sa untransparent use of budget funds and creation of a new social elite on the basis of personal criteria and preference of Janez Janša.
In fact, Janša introduced in Slovenia an autocratic, chancellor-model of government in which all decisions are made by one single person – Janez Janša. The abuse of the repressive police apparatus and security-intelligence services, which keeps surveillance on opposition politicians, reporters and civil society, has also become evident. On many occasions Slovenian and foreign organizations dealing with human rights and status of democracy warned about the developments in the Slovenian society. Drops in ratings of Slovenia were also recorded in a number of areas. At the same time, during the rule of Janez Janša, the speaker of the parliament, who is a member of an opposition party, served a major part of his mandate. This indicates that there is no clear parliamentary majority.
The revision of Slovenian history by the current Slovenian government is aimed to present the defeated forces from World War II as the winners. Awakening of the defeated fascist ideologies has become a constant of the current government and it triggers strong reactions at social and political level. Slovenians as a nation are profound antifascists and very sensitive when it comes to falsification of history.
Features of the autocratization process are also apparent through the intensive attacks on the civil society, attacks on the reporters and censorship in the media. According to the report on the status of democracy by the University in Gothenborg, the states with increased media censorship by the government are Mauritius, Poland and Slovenia. The countries that are most rapidly plunging into autocracy include Afghanistan, Ivory Coast, Tunisia, Myanmar and Slovenia. According to the global Human Freedom Index, Slovenia has dropped to the 36th position, which indicates a descending trend. Furthermore, according to Gallup, Slovenia is among the top ten countries when it comes to anti-American sentiments.
Analysts believe that just as he himself had announced, Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Janša needs five years for the experiment of “liberation” of Slovenia. In this context, he naturally plans to change the mindset of Slovenians as a profoundly antifascist nation into something diametrically opposite.
In Slovenia, in the fourth election cycle the voters showed mistrust in established political parties. This is a consequence of their actions so far, because they did not offer innovative political programs, new faces and a more certain future to the citizens. It needs to be emphasized that while in 2004, when it became an EU member, Slovenia was the leading country in the group of 10 newly integrated countries by all indicators, it is now in the middle of the rankings. As a politician and president of a political party, Janez Janša is the only one in the EU with an almost 30-year mandate, which is a novum in democratic societies. This is an indicator of incapacitated democracy and leads to autocracy.
Analysts believe that Slovenia is faced with a serious crisis of political elites, which commenced with the departure of prime minister and president of many years, Janez Drnovšek, from the political scene. As a result of such a situation, in each election cycle the voters seek new trustworthy individuals. At the current elections, they see Robert Golob as such an individual and his recently established Freedom Movement is the favorite in the parliamentary elections.
The data presented by the Chair of the Commission for Prevention of Corruption (KPK) Robert Šumi, according to which Slovenia is at major loss because of corruption and loses up to 3.5 billion Euros per year (which practically is the entire budget of the Republic of North Macedonia) offers an illustration of the situation in Slovenia.
Public opinion polls indicate that the Freedom Movement has a lead, and is followed by the Slovenian Democratic Party. Namely, the parliamentary elections will factually be a contest between two main political contestants. Specifically, Golob's Freedom Movement and Janša's SDS, which diminishes the chances of smaller parties to pass the election threshold.
Analysts believe that Slovenia needs competent politicians with democratic capacity to achieve the much needed social consensus on the future. Slovenia needs a higher level of political culture, as in the current mandate of Janša's government it had reached the lowest level since it gained independence. After the elections, Slovenia will need a “conclave” of key actors of the Slovenian state and society to decide on how is Slovenia to stop its further regression and ensure its future. The announced political changes in Slovenia also open the possibility of repetition of “Trump's syndrome” in the transfer of authority. It is possible that the current government will not recognize the results of the elections and bring into question the legality and legitimacy of the election process and in such a way try to justify the defeat at the elections to its voters. Parliamentary elections will also have a direct impact on the local and presidential elections scheduled to take place in the second half of 2022.
The elections are organized according to the proportional electoral system in eight constituencies, comprising of 11 election districts. The total number of eligible votes if 1,699,433. Each constituency is assigned 11 representative mandates (one per district), which will subsequently be divided at the level of the constituency and the state level among political parties proportionally to the share of votes won. In addition to 88 representatives, separate elections are organized for two representatives of ethnic communities (Italian and Hungarian), which will be elected according to the majority system in two separate electoral units (so called ethnic community electoral units). Hence, members of ethnic communities will vote two times at the elections for the Slovenian parliament, which amounts to positive discrimination. The election threshold is 4%.
All political parties whose lists get supported with signatures of three representatives or 100 voters at the state level and 50 at the constituency level, can run at the elections. The requirement for nonpartisan election lists is 1000 signatures of voters in each of the 8 constituencies.
There was a flurry of activity in the final months of 2021 as parties staked out their positions by adopting election manifestos. The center field in particular was crowded as parties attempted to distance themselves from the more radical positions of the ruling Democrats (SDS) and Left on either end of the political spectrum to appeal to moderate voters. Alliances were built left and right, some as a counterweight to the long dominant SDS, others in order for parties to have a better shot at achieving tne 4% general election threshold to enter the National Assembly.
Four parliamentary centre-left opposition parties - LMŠ, SD, Left and SAB - signed a pact on post-election cooperation in September 2021. They plan to contest the campaign individually, whereupon the best-performing party would nominate the prime minister-designate. There had been mounting calls for the four to also forge a closer pre-election coalition, with some analysts arguing that this was the only way to defeat Prime Minister Janez Janša's SDS and potentially deflect challenges by up-and-coming alliances.
One forthcoming alliance, called Connect Slovenia, featured parties including Economy Minister Zdravko Pocivalšek's Concretely and the party of former Maribor mayor Franc Kangler. They were in talks several smaller local lists to broaden their appeal.
Two green parties are also on the horizon, an attempt to capitalise on the increasing importance of green policies and finally bring green back into the mainstream, from which it has been absent for more than two decades. One was formed by Jure Leben, a former environment minister, the other was announced by two prominent green activists, Uroš Macerl and Urška Zgojznik.
Parliamentary Speaker Igor Zorcic, meanwhile, has announced he will form a liberal democratic party and has entered into talks with several prominent mayors. The party is expected to be formally established soon. One major unknown in erly 2022 was the trajectory of Robert Golob, the ousted CEO of energy trader Gen-I. Early polls show he currently enjoys significant support, but it remains unclear whether he will enter the election with a party or join an existing group. He had been coy, saying that he would get politically active through a broad movement. Another party that early polls indicate might have a shot as well is Our Land, created by Aleksandra Pivec, a former agriculture minister who was swept away by an expenses scandal.
The Vox Populi poll carried out for the newspapers Dnevnik and Vecer showed that the four centre-left opposition parties which have previously joined forces in an informal coalition to topple the current Janez Janša government, would win a combined 51 seats in the 90-seat parliament if an election was held 16 August 2021.
This poll showed that Janša's ruling Democrats (SDS) continue enjoying the strongest support at 18%, up 0.2 of a percentage point in August over July. The SDS is followed by three centre-left opposition parties - the SD at 12.2%, Left at 8.9% and the Marjan Šarec List (LMŠ at 8.5%), all slightly down over July. The fourth centre-left coalition party, the SAB, polled at 3.4%.
Based on the number of votes by decided voters, the support would translate into 19 seats for the SD, 14 seats for the and 13 for the LMŠ of former PM Šarec. The coalition New Slovenia (NSi) meanwhile polled at 5.5%, with all the other parties, be it parliamentary or non-parliamentary, including the coalition Modern Centre Party (SMC), polling at 1.4% or lower. The number of undecided voters has increased from 29.6% in July to 30.4%, while 6.9% said they would not go to the polls, up from 6.5%.
According to exit polls, Slovenia opposition liberals ousted the ruling right-wing illiberal populists of Prime Minister Janez Jansa, with a large majority. There was an unexpected huge turnout. On this day, after two years, Slovenia began to reverse its devastating drift toward illiberal autocracy.
The presidential election, to be held in autumn, will be wide open since Borut Pahor, the incumbent, is term limited and will not contest the election. Parliamentary parties remain tight-lipped about potential candidates as they focus on the general election, and it remains unclear whether some parties will join forces or field their own candidates at least in the first round of voting.
The name most often mentioned by the media as a serious contender is Ljudmila Novak, the MEP for the Christian democratic New Slovenia (NSi), who has overtaken Pahor in popularity rankings this year. She has not made any announcements yet and it is not certain that she would even be considered by her own party given significant differences with the party's young leadership.
Local elections - 20 November
Local elections have a fixed date on the third Sunday of November but for all intents and purposes campaigning has already started as municipalities traditionally ramp up local investments in the final year before ballots are cast. The local votes rarely reflect political realities at the national level as many candidates in Slovenia's 212 municipalities are elected from local lists without a firm party affiliation, or from smaller parties that are not represented in parliament. In the last election, the People's Party (SLS) ended with the largest number of mayors despite being absent from national politics since 2014.One major factor affecting local ballots will be how many mayors decide to enter the general election. MPs are prohibited by law from serving as mayors and whoever is elected to parliament must give up their mayoral office.
National Council
Finishing its five-year termm elections to the National Council, the upper chamber of parliament, are typically below the radar since councillors are elected indirectly by interest groups representing employers, trade unions, farmers, craftspersons, non-commercial activities and, most notably, local communities. The National Council does not have the kind of powers that upper chambers have in true bicameral systems, but during its current term it has shown it can strongly affect politics nevertheless with its veto powers.
While it wielded the veto liberally during the term of the previous government, it was more accommodating to the current government in pre-emptively giving up veto powers when the National Assembly passed any of the ten Covid relief bills, so that the legislation could take effect immediately.
The reason its veto power has mattered more is that both the present and the previous government were minority governments in a hung parliament, making it very difficult to muster the absolute majority that is required in a re-vote.
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