2024-08-16 07:00:27
The leadership of the Ministry of Culture is arrogant and incompetent, it was said at Tuesday’s demonstration, which was called by two opposition parties in Bratislava. They did so in protest against the decisions of the Minister of Culture Martina Šimkovičová and also against the actions of the Minister of Justice Boris Susko.
The organizers estimated the number of participants at 18,000, while a day earlier the citizens’ initiative Open Culture brought 9,000 opponents of Šimkovičová to the streets. Even on Tuesday, the organizers did not include politicians’ performances in the program.
The demonstration was triggered by the decision of the Minister of Culture, who dismissed the director of the Slovak National Theater and the Slovak National Gallery last week. Both were subsequently supported by many cultural institutions and artists in Slovakia and also in the Czech Republic. Šimkovičová claims that the opposition and the media want to disparage her.
“We are watching live the dismantling of the cultural infrastructure. We live in a country where the highest constitutional officials ignore expertise, suppress education, question facts, intimidate citizens and issue directive orders. Decency, dignity, correctness are disappearing from communication,” said former Slovak Minister of Culture Silvia Hroncová, who was a member of the then official government before last year’s parliamentary elections. Even before that, she led the Prague Opera.
In a joint statement, Hroncová and four other Slovak ex-ministers of culture rejected Šimkovičová’s actions. According to them, it tries to normalize culture, degrades expertise and divides society.
Among other things, the crowd chanted “Resign”, “Enough of Fica” and other slogans.
“I have never encountered such a degree of arrogance combined with incompetence as represented by the current leadership of the Ministry of Culture. Let us not bow our heads before the blunt government power, which tests the limits of our patience,” said former head of public radio and television Ľuboš Machaj from the podium, who ended at the beginning of July after the approval of the new law on the public station and after its renaming.
“The state of the rule of law is falling apart, Slovakia is on the edge of the abyss and we must not allow it to fall into it,” diplomat and former head of the presidential office Metod Špaček said in a speech.
Tuesday’s demonstration was organized by the strongest opposition movement Progressive Slovakia together with the Freedom and Solidarity party. The opposition Christian Democratic Movement, which previously collaborated with both parties on other demonstrations, did not join this time. In a statement, it said that protests organized by artists or people without a political background could exert stronger pressure on the governing coalition. However, the movement supports the effort to impeach Šimkovičová or the Minister of Justice Susko in the lower house, for which, however, the opposition does not have enough votes.
Susko previously pushed through changes in criminal law, which, in addition to the abolition of the Special Prosecutor’s Office, led to, for example, reduced sentences for certain crimes or shortened statutes of limitations. Last week, Susko also used his authority and interrupted the execution of the eight-year prison sentence of the former head of the office, Dušan Kováčik, who was found guilty the year before, among other things, of corruption.
At the same time, the minister filed an extraordinary appeal against the convicting verdict.
Former TV presenter Martina Šimkovičová, who promotes so-called traditional culture and defines herself with respect to LGBT+ topics, for example, was criticized by some representatives of culture, the public and the opposition when she took over as head of the Ministry of Culture last year. There, the Slovak National Party appointed four-time prime minister Robert Fico as a minister in the government.
Just after the dismissal of the heads of the Slovak National Theater and then the Slovak National Gallery, Šimkovičová is now facing a new wave of criticism. Almost 190,000 people have already signed a new petition online for her to resign. Slovak Prime Minister Fico defended Šimkovičová, according to him, she proceeded in accordance with the law during the personnel changes.
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