Politics
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Patria APC - Impenetrable for everything but corruption. (Photo: BOBO)
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European elections: Low turnout, all-satisfying results.
In Memoriam .... 2009
Top of the Pops
08.01.2010
The year has been a busy year for Slovenia’s politicians as well as the country’s economy. A new government was inaugurated just in time to see the economy take a dive. Is this government up to the job? We bring you the very best (and some of infamous) events of Slovenian politics in the last twelve months (or so), so that you can decide for yourself.A little more than a year has passed since the September 2008 parliamentary elections ushered in a left-wing government in Slovenia. Three months earlier, Slovenia (under the government of Janez Janša) more or less successfully concluded its first-ever six-month EU presidency, which signalled the start of political hunting season. Whether it culminated in last year’s elections or was that just an appetizer of things to come, remains to be seen. Elections brought about a much-needed (or much-feared, depending on one’s political persuasion) change in government. Thus was – by the narrowest of margins – the seemingly authoritarian political style of Janez Janša was replaced by seemingly indecisive political style of the current Prime Minister Borut Pahor.
The fall of tycoons
One of the many pieces of baggage transferred from Janša to Pahor, “tycoon” (think of a severely scaled-down Russian oligarch) was a term reserved for a select few. Igor Bavčar of Istrabenz and Boško Šrot of Laško Brewery launched debt-fuelled MBOs of their respective companies (following what appeared to be a silent nod by the previous government) and failed, more or less miserably. Bavčar crash landed of his own accord, mostly by mismanaging Istrabenz’s assets, while Boško Šrot played hardball and was stopped only by a combination of the credit crunch and the lack of any political support whatsoever. He fell out with Janša while the latter was still in power, while the new government (especially Zares, a junior coalition party) flat out denounced him and his methods. Consequently, the largest state-owned bank, NLB, refused to extend his credit line, which brought down his house of cards.
Just rhetoric
Not that Zares, then clearly a political party on the rise, did not have its share of problems. Just as it was on a roll with its anti-tycoon, pro-transparency rhetoric, documents were leaked showing that Ultra, a Zagorje-based high-tech company strongly connected to Zares president Gregor Golobič, got a very cosy credit line with NLB, the same state-owned bank whom Zares forced to stop loaning money to Boško Šrot.
In the PR fiasco that followed, it transpired that Golobič, when divulging his assets to the press, neglected to mention that he owned a small share of Ultra. In accordance with legal requirements, he did report the share to the anti-corruption commission, but failing to tell the press about it unleashed journalistic fury, and he was extremely close to resigning. In the end, he stayed his post, but earned another black eye for the coalition.
No country for bankers
Speaking of shooting oneself in the foot, there is something to be said for the way Katarina Kresal, the boss of LDS, the smallest of the coalition partners in the government, and Draško Veselinovič, a well-known banker, performed that particular feat. Veselinovič ran on the LDS ticket and was supposed to become an MP after Katarina Kresal was appointed minister of the interior. But since Veselinovič was already earmarked for the post of CEO of NLB, he took a pass and was appointed to the top of NLB.
Having achieved that through what still seems like a deal between PM Pahor and Katarina Kresal, Veselinović earned the ire of Zares, which threatened to quit the coalition if appointments were to be made without tenders and in a non-transparent way. The newly minted CEO came under even more intense fire after the bank renewed the credit line to Boško Šrot for his MBO of Laško Brewery. This proved to be the straw which broke the camel’s back, and Zares (fanned by public outrage over the renewal of credit) went after Veselinovič with everything they had. He offered to resign, hoping that the gesture would take some of the heat off his back, but he was surprised to see the bank’s supervisory board accept his resignation. Since his fall from grace preceded that of Golobič, some speculate that the Ultra affair was payback for bringing Veselinovič down.
Good times are over
As if coalition infighting – intermittently threatening to erupt in a full-scale civil war – wasn’t enough, there seems to be some confusion about how to tackle the economic crisis. Granted, Pahor’s government inherited an overheated economy that was as prepared for the crisis as New Orleans was for Katrina. As the crisis struck with great vengeance and furious anger in the US, Slovenia was just entering the final stages of the election campaign.
Former PM and now the leader of the opposition Janez Janša played down the crisis threat, famously saying that “you don’t cure a cold by administering antibiotics,” but even though the left bloc turned out to be correct in forecasting near economic doom, that apparently did not translate into them knowing how to go about it. Some results have been achieved and one can argue that situation would have been much worse if the government hadn’t done what it had. A nagging feeling of chronic underachievement remains, however.
Pro patria ...
And thus we end on a military note. No recap of the year would be complete without mentioning the Patria affair, which started back during Janša administration. Granted, arms deals are always shady; just ask Willy Claes. However, when Slovenia set out to buy two battalions-worth of these Finnish armoured personnel carriers, people started paying attention. Not in the least because the other bidder (Slovenia-based Sistemska tehnika) cried foul early in the game, and because the combination of Janez Janša and an arms deal always spells interesting times.
No one, however, could imagine just how interesting this one would get. A Finnish journalist investigating the ways in which Patria did business abroad claimed that the company bribed PM Janša into approving the deal. Janša naturally denied the accusations and sued a number of people; the Slovenian Court of Audit said that the arms deal was anything but economical and failed to meet most of its objectives, but the majority of people are just waiting to see what (if anything) will Finnish police, which is investigating Patria, will discover.