RUZOMBEROK, November 12, (WEBNOVINY)- Slovakia’s strongest opposition political party, Robert Fico’s SMER-SD holds its 11th congress in Ruzomberok on Saturday. Its central slogan is “alternative against chaos and price hikes.“ The congress is to approve a strategy for the next period after Fico introduces it to delegates. The party leadership invited neither foreign guests nor representatives of the local political scene to the congress this year. In contrast, representatives of trade unions, the Slovak Union of Towns and Villages and the Slovak Unity of Pensioners showed up to greet the congress. The delegates will also elect the new leadership of the party.
In his address, Robert Fico stated that in the next parliamentary elections, SMER-SD has to garner more votes than in June and become a ruling party again. He underscored that it simply cannot happen that SMER repeatedly fails to mobilize its partisans in towns and villages across the country as intensively as the right parties were able to do it in Bratislava. The SMER leader stated that if they had succeeded with mobilization the party could have won nearly 40 percent. Mobilization of the votes is the party’s main task, added Fico.
Fico underscored that if the right parties are able to rule alone it will do so even if SMER behaved constructively to them. He said that SMER’s opinion on the method of ruling is different from that of the right parties. He underscored that his government did not privatize while the incumbent one does. “We are for big public investments. They are against them,” he stated.
The SMER-SD boss however admitted in his speech that also his party erred several times when in power and had to bear co-responsibility for mistakes of its coalition partners but he underlined that it has never laundered money.
Fico said that his party has to hold on tight to the social-democratic policy. It cannot wait around and look how somebody comes up with proposals to hike taxes. It would not be sufficient if the SMER-SD with its potential only criticizes the development. “We will submit an alternative,” he said. If the government is not able to propose other measures than the higher VAT SMER-SD will come up with an alternative. Also for this reason. the party plans to form a shadow cabinet after the regional elections which will produce alternative solutions. SMER-SD’s ambition is as well to unmask the current coalition as the rule of chaos and non-systemic decisions. Let’s they pay for it in live broadcast,” stated Fico underscoring that the coalition misled its voters. He said that Prime Minister Iveta Radicova promised before elections that the right parties will not hike taxes and privatize while the coalition promised to decriminalize marijuana, enact same-sex partnerships and sign agreements with the Holy See. However the government actually did nothing except for hiking taxes, stopping highways and failing to agree on a joint candidate for the prosecutor general post. “What alternative does the government offer?” asked Fico.
The SMER party was set up in December 1999 as a reaction to the policy of the then ruling coalition. In September 2002 elections SMER garnered 13.6 percent of the vote, which pushed it to the position of Slovakia’s third strongest party with 25 mandates in the 150-member House. Four years later it won the next race and formed a new ruling coalition with the HZDS and the SNS. In June 2001, SMER harvested even more votes but it was not able to give Slovakia a new government and thus it operates as an opposition party despite being on the top of political popularity charts for years.
SITA
