BRATISLAVA, January 3, (WEBNOVINY) — The opposition leader SMER-SD party wants to convene an unscheduled session of parliament after January 15, where the only topic will be the election of the prosecutor general. The party of Robert Fico demands a secret ballot. “If it is true that the ruling coalition has confidence, it has 79 votes [in 150-member parliament — SITA new] and at the same time they have a candidate, whose name is Mr. Centes, we think it would not be appropriate to wait until May, when for the first time we can realistically elect a prosecutor general. We have to undertake the election as soon as possible,” said Fico at a news conference on Monday. MPs for his party will nominate two candidates: incumbent Dobroslav Trnka and Jozef Centes, who were the two most serious candidates for the office in the recent unsuccessful election.
The next regular parliamentary session is starting on February 1, 2011, and the term of the incumbent Prosecutor General ends on February 2. This is the reason why SMER-SD would like to elect the prosecutor general earlier with the help of thirty signatures of SMER-SD MPs [required to convene a session of parliament — SITA note]. “It is not possible for the parliament to let the date, until when the prosecutor general effectively is in office, go by – and then wait three, four months to change the rules of procedure of the Slovak Parliament and to elect the prosecutor general in a public vote,” stated Fico.
The leaders of the ruling coalition have agreed on changing the election from secret to public in December 2010, after none of the coalition candidates was elected on the third attempt. In the fourth ballot, the coalition MPs used an obstruction rendering impossible the re-election of Dobroslav Trnka, for whom the opposition SMER-SD and SNS deputies voted.
SITA