Former Prime Minister Robert Fico’s populist Social Leadership Democracy (Smer-SSD) party, which opposes aid to Ukraine, won the legislative elections in Slovakia, according to final results published this morning.
According to the Slovak Statistics Office, after counting the votes of almost six thousand assemblies, the Smer-SSD obtained 23.3%, ahead of the liberal Progressive Slovakia party (17.1%), led by the vice-president of the European Parliament, Michal Simecka.
Since no party won a majority of seats in Slovakia’s parliament, the country’s future may depend on the party that came third with 14.9% of the vote, the social democrats of Hlas-SD (‘The Voice’). , by former Prime Minister Peter Pellegrini, a Smer-SSD dissident but who shares Simecka’s pro-Ukraine position.
Another potential partner in a hypothetical government alliance with Robert Fico, the ultranationalist Slovak National Party (SNS), obtained 5.7% of the votes.
If he manages to form a coalition and return to power, after five years of interregnum, Fico, 59 years old and a law graduate, has already committed to “immediately ceasing any delivery of military aid to Ukraine.”
Something that would imply a turning point in the foreign policy of this country of 5.4 million inhabitants, a member of the European Union and NATO, and which has provided considerable aid to Kiev since the beginning of the Russian invasion in February 2022.
“The war in Ukraine began in 2014, when Ukrainian fascists killed civilian victims of Russian nationality,” Fico stated in a recent video, likely referring to the events that occurred at the Odessa House of Trade Unions on May 2, this year.
A message that resonates in a country where, according to a survey by the Globsec institute, only 40% of the population considers Russia responsible for the war.
Fico also stated that he would not authorize the detention of Russian President Vladimir Putin under an International Criminal Court arrest warrant if he ever came to Slovakia.
During the election campaign, Slovakia was the target of intense disinformation actions: opinion studies show that half of the population is willing to believe fake news.
The Central European country is currently governed by an executive of technocrats, led by banker Ludovit Odor, after the collapse, in a motion of no confidence in December, of a fragile anti-corruption coalition that had been in power since 2020.
Source: TSF
