BRATISLAVA, February 19, (WEBNOVINY)- The ruling coalition maintains its parliamentary majority, said KDH Deputy Chairman and head of the KDH deputy club Pavol Hrusovsky in a regular Slovak Radio political debate ‘Saturday Dialogues.’ He however openly admitted that the coalition faces problems. Though the ruling quartet has lost recently two deputies it is possible for now to speak about the loss of only one lawmaker –Ivan Matovic, said Hrusovsky explaining that KDH’s Andrej Durkovsky lost his party membership and thus also his place in its deputy caucus. However Durkovsky showed strong determination to continue supporting the coalition, said the KDH senior official. Hrusovsky characterized Igor Matovic as a politician not always compatible with the program of the party for which he ran. Hrusovsky however blames the failure to include requirements of Matovic’ Ordinary People in the government statement on SaS Chairman Richard Sulik.
Deputy Speaker of Parliament and opposition SMER-SD leader Robert Fico insists that “This is a bad government and we are doing everything in our power to have it replaced as soon as possible.“ He underscored that SMER-SD will not help the government in decisions, on which it hold a different opinion. However the government will be able to rely on SMER-SD votes when it come to issues regarding national and state interests of Slovakia or huge projects such as highways and nuclear power plants. Fico said that the current situation is suitable for comparing his previous government with the incumbent one. He says that the situation in the ruling coalition bothers people who want to see a strong prime minister, functional government and construction of highways progressing while what they do not want is higher prices of electricity and other stuffs. Fico opines that problems within the coalition are meant to counter massive price hikes, which he attributes mainly to the government’s consolidation package. SMER-SD wants to maintain state control over heating plants and will propose stopping privatization of strategic companies in parliament. Another suggestion of the party heading to parliament is the law on bank tax, which is tailored to decrease VAT.
SITA