The First Steps

Hardly two weeks have passed since elections, and it is interesting to follow certain discussions on the web with regards to the newly-to-be-formed coalition. While taking a consolidated step of a sense of responsibility forward, there are certain issues that need to be thoroughly dealt with before the four-coalition will be able to take off. 

Meanwhile they already have agreed on a list of basic issues, which has been an astonishingly fast process, further details will need a bit more time. Already heated criticism as "you see, the rightists are not able to agree on a single issue", or even "the rightist government is completely incompetent" (when there is no new government yet). This illustrates how little society understands democratic processes.

Taking into account, that the Dutch have voted two weeks before the Slovaks, until now, there is not even a consensus on which parties will form a coalition and which not. And here we deal with a country that has had a parliamentary system for hundreds of years. 

The greatest shock of all, was the news, that the state budget has a much bigger deficit than has been admitted. As far as I remember, no democratic country has such an non-transparent budget mechanism as Slovakia, where the role of controlling government by the parliament has been so deliberately obstructed by a prime minister as Fico did. Therefore the burden of the new coalition will be a very heavy one, understandably. 

The Slovaks will face some unpleasant times ahead; where the state deficit must be put under control - which is after all an EU requirement - but equally cleansing the state-apparatus thoroughly. Fico's ministers even after the elections, manage to sign over-priced contracts to accommodate their buddies, which only illustrates how rotten Fico's soviet-styled gang has been ruling the country. Even at bright daylight they manage to steal your pockets empty to the last crumb. 

Slovakia will one of these weeks definitively have the first government without any former communist inside for an ex-Eastern block country. It is about time, so be patient. The work - which actually should have started 20 years ago - finally needs to be done. 

MS