Liberal newcomer surprisingly wins parliamentary election

2023-10-01 01:35:20

According to a forecast, the liberal party “Progressive Slovakia” (PS), which is not yet represented in parliament, has surprisingly won the parliamentary election in Slovakia. According to this unofficial result published by the private television channel TV Markiza on Saturday evening, the Liberals, led by MEP Michal Šimečka, achieved 23.5 percent. The left-wing national opposition party “Towards – Slovak Social Democracy” (Smer-SSD), led by former long-term head of government Robert Fico, which was leading in the polls for months, came in second place with 21.9 percent.

The more liberal Social Democrats under former Prime Minister Peter Pellegrini, who split off from the Fico party, are now likely to tip the scales. This party called “Voice – Social Democracy” (Hlas-SD), together with small bourgeois parties, could help the PS achieve a comfortable majority – or prevent it. In the latter case, however, there would be a risk of a stalemate because Smer would have difficulty finding the coalition partners needed other than Hlas.

Slovakia is considered an important supporter of Ukraine

Around 4.4 million citizens were called upon to elect a new parliament. The EU and NATO country Slovakia borders directly on Ukraine and has so far been one of the most determined political and military supporters of the neighboring country attacked by Russia. However, Fico had announced that he would end the arms aid program, which was unpopular with the population, if he came back to power.

Surprisingly, TV Markiza published the forecast before the official election deadline, but without initially specifying the party names. According to the law, it is forbidden to publish election results until the last polling station has closed.

Stephan Löwenstein, Vienna Published/Updated: , Recommendations: 5 Published/Updated: Niklas Zimmermann and Stephan Löwenstein Published/Updated: Recommendations: 19

The election, which began on Saturday morning, ended late in the evening late in the evening. Instead of 10 p.m. as planned, the last polling stations closed three quarters of an hour later. The reason for this were problems in individual polling stations where election commission members had health problems. According to the law, interruptions in voting must be compensated for by a corresponding extension of the voting time.