A High Toll for Fico

Slovakia's Prime-Minister Fico, despite of earlier unrelenting statements, seemed to have made a few concessions towards the protesting truck drivers. Nevertheless, his populist propaganda method he continues to persistingly feed the TV cameras with untrue facts. While nobody is opposing the principle of an electronic toll system, the implemented monstrum is an absolute technical failure. Until today, Minister Vážný of Transportation still likes to claim that the system is functioning correctly ("excelently"), reality however is completely the opposite.

The very mere fact, that the tender for this system was won by an obscure newly established company, which even had the highest bid (resulting in an overpayment of about 250 million Euros!). While suspiciously the requirements during the tender were cleverly adjusted, such that other bidders would no longer meet the demands, the outcome was more or less clear. But then, this is nearly a common practice for most tenders under Fico. EU regulations or not.

The system works based on GPS locating. What happens in practice is that let's say a truck has to deliver goods at several locations next to the toll way. He departs from his home, and the moment he reaches the coordinates, the whole amount for a 9km route is charged - after 1km he leaves this route to arrive at his first client. When done with unloading and the usual paper stuff, he heads back to the toll way in order to continue his round. Again he will be charged for 9km. The result is, for leaving the main road in order to do his usual deliveries (which is basically his job) he will be charged x-times the full 9km every time when the GPS is assuming him re-entering the said road, resulting in a tremendous overcharge. Equally other hardware related inadequacies have been detected, which could have been easily avoided, and not to mention the total chaos at the registration offices.

Despite running systems in other European countries, this particular technology has been implemented clearly by an incompetent company (which was to be expected), without any adequate testing. In real life, any project manager, who dare to deliver such faulty product will definitively fly out the doors at sound speed. In Slovakia, the responsible ministers keep claiming how well the system works, that unnecessary negative press by the media is causing misinformation to discredit government, that the truck drivers didn't order the hardware on time, or that the drivers don't want to pay for a toll system.

The couple Fico-Vážný should have realised earlier; doing murky business is always risky. The toll system is a visible result of their unacceptable amateurism. While you can hide many fishy deals behind closed doors or misty political rhetoric, a toll system is visible to the common man in the street (or in a truck, that is). It exposes exactly, how unprofessional and unprepaired leadership is pushing forward something at the expense of literally everything.

In Germany similar hiccups - even though definitively more professionalism was involved - caused the responsible people to resign and the system was suspended until technical adjustments were made. Makes sense, I would say. Here Fico pushed too far. And by continuing to state that 'truck drivers' don't want to pay, he is slowly putting himself into a hazardous position. His compromise to postpone the electronic toll charging till the end of the month (while the official opinion is, that there is nothing wrong with the system), lowering tax on diesel to curb costs for the logistic sector, seems a slight victory. Fico for sure never expected such a uproar in society - I guess, it could have easily been avoided - but he hardly really gives in. It is surely a tactic to stretch time and make him look as the powerful statesman.

Nobody has ever denied the fact, that a toll system is necessary. Obviously good infrastructure must be financed - especially by the user - and this is quite fair. The quality of Slovakia's roads is alarming - even when a road is being repaired or constructed, in a few days it starts having holes. An engineer to explain me why. So never has there been any demand to abolish the toll system, only to stop this nonsensical inadequate system to be improved to a normal acceptable standard.

The question is, whether this time he has been stretching a bit too far. A project like this is more than embarrassing. The fact that common people - truck drivers - from all over the country have now directly experienced Fico's totally incompetent administration. What they see in practice, and what Fico is telling the cameras could equally starting to work against his government. Why blaming the involved parties for only protesting now and not before?... well, because not a single expert had any clue what was going on. When keeping things secret, it is hard to establish founded evaluations beforehand. It usually goes, that a criminal is successful, until he makes his first mistake. This toll system could in the end indeed be a very high toll for Fico, for he made too many mistakes. I only hope, that this gives him some sleepless nights already.

MS