BRATISLAVA, May 9, (WEBNOVINY) — Parliament may again witness a struggle for the possibility to soften the consequences of the current citizenship act, which strips any Slovak who obtains another country’s passport of his/her free will of his Slovak citizenship on the same day. The previous government enacted the so-called anti-law in response to Budapest’s dual citizenship law, which further foresees giving the voting right even to Hungarians living outside Hungary after they are granted Hungarian citizenship. To obtain it, no ties with the „motherland“ need to be documented.
Two amendments to soften the effects of the valid law are on the agenda of the upcoming parliamentary session. SMER-SD MPs have sent to parliament one draft while the leader of the Ordinary People, a member of the faction of the SaS party, Igor Matovic has submitted his own draft. Matovic wants that the citizenship is left to people who can document at least one-year registered stay abroad where they worked, studied, conducted business, executed charity and missionary activities, were top athletes, took care of their child or their parents or grandparents come from there. In contrast, the party SMER-SD conditions permissible other than Slovak citizenship on the single request – at least one-year continuous stay in the given country.
Matovic does not intend to support SMER-SD’s draft amendment and he believes his own draft has a chance to get enough votes to go through. Though only he is its only signatory, he expects also other members of the Ordinary People movement will support it. Moreover, so far KDH’s MP Radoslav Prochazka has voted so far for each similar change to the law and also now he has no factual comments to Matovic’s draft and thus it is very likely he will support it. Moreover, SMER-SD does not rule out giving its support to Matovic. “We have submitted our own proposal but the issue is certainly what matters and thus we will consider the best solution,” said spokesman for the party Erik Tomas. If the whole opposition plus four Ordinary People and Prochazka all raise their hands for Matovic’s proposal, it would get support of 76 deputies, which would be enough to push it through.
KDH Deputy Chairman Pavol Abrhan however rejects to support the amendments. He said that the coalition will come up with is own proposal instantly after Parliament debates an amendment to the law on ethnic minority languages. Parliament will vote on the minority language amendment in the course of the May session as well. Deputy Chairman of the SDKU-DS deputy club Stanislav Janis is not enthusiastic about the amendments prepared by Matovic and SMER-SD either. According to him there are more serious problems in Slovakia than adjusting conditions for gaining dual citizenship. Let’s deal with unemployment, get stronger on the international scene,” he said.
Matovic however thinks that all coalition MPs should vote for his amendment. “They should vote for the proposal which is part of the government program statement, If they do not vote, it will turn out what they care more about: their own ego or the citizens,” he said. According to Matovic, behind the lukewarm attitude of the coalition to his proposal and delaying the topic until September is that the coalition wants to deal with the issue as late as possible since his expulsion from the SaS deputy club because it will in all probability come to a solution similar to the one he presented in January. Matovic was expelled from the SaS parliamentary caucus because in February he voted with SMER-SD for an amendment to the citizenship law though he announced before the vote that the Ordinary People will not support the proposal.
Matovic comes up with his amendment just when the threat of Prime Minister Iveta Radicova’s resignation is hovering over the ruling coalition. She threatens to step down if the parliament re-elects Dobroslav Trnka to the post of prosecutor general. Despite this critical situation Matovic does not intend to wait. “I do not plan to wait until the autumn, I will not hold the people hostage,” he said.
SITA