BRATISLAVA, November 6, (WEBNOVINY) — Mikulas Dzurinda will remain chairman of the SDKU-DS party for four more years, delegates of the party congress in Bratislava decided on Saturday. Dzurinda had no rival in the elections for party chairman at the congress of the strongest party in the governing coalition in Slovakia.
Dzurinda (55) was first elected SDKU chairman at the party’s founding congress on November 17, 2000. Since then, he twice served as Slovak prime minister, after the parliamentary elections in 1998 and 2002. In 1994, he was Minister of Transport. Since July 2010 he is the Minister of Foreign Affairs.
In his address at the congress before the vote, Dzurinda said that a strong and united SDKU stands behind Prime Minister Iveta Radicova. „We want a strong Slovakia, we want a successful Prime Minister, we will therefore help her with all our might,“ he said. At the same time, he thanked Radicova for accepting the greatest responsibility for the future development of the country. The previous elections have brought a defeat of nationalism and Meciarism. However, Fico’s government took from Meciarism several tools such as nationalism. „Slovakia does not have a standard Social Democracy, but a corrupt bunch of communists, who did not even notice what happened in November 1989,“ he said. According to him, a new clone Meciarism was reborn in Robert Fico’s party. „We must never align with such policies, we can only defeat it. Just as we defeated Meciarism, we must defeat SMER-SD with its malevolent anti-popular policy,“ said Dzurinda said. He pledged that the SDKU would not enter into a coalition of SMER-SD even after the next elections. It would make every effort to ensure that the future government was without SMER-SD. „This is a meaningful internal political challenge,“ he said.
A new challenge is also the struggle for the future character of Europe and thus also of our country. „There are politicians whose ambition is to be reelected. They squander money to those who pay taxes. Populism has brought close to collapse several European countries. Moral hazard has caused problems in Europe. People are governed by populists with hazardous policies. They must be confronted by a policy of responsibility. They are beginning to understand us in Europe,“ said the SDKU chief.
Dzurinda also explained why he decided this year to against running as the party’s election leader. He said he wanted to protect the party from the attacks. „It was a success,“ he said.
The SDKU congress is taking place within six months after parliamentary elections as the party statutes require. To congress has two foreign guests, Czech Prime Minister and ODS party chairman Petr Necas and Serbian Deputy Prime Minister Mladan Dinkic.
SITA