Marušiak does not assume that the president’s report will be “overwhelmingly” critical – PRAVDA.sk

President Zuzana Čaputová should present a report on the state of the republic at the session of parliament, which will begin on Thursday, September 16. Political scientist Juraj Marušiak does not expect the president to be “overwhelmingly” critical. As he told SITA, with the Prime Minister Eduard Heger (OĽaNO), the head of state has significantly better relations than he had with his predecessor Igor Matovič (OĽaNO).

At the end of June this year, a spokeswoman for the president informed that she had asked the Speaker of the Parliament, Boris Kollár (We Are the Family), to include her speech at the September part-session.

Last year, President Čaputová spoke in parliament in early June. This year, she postponed her speech before the Chamber of Deputies. Political scientist Juraj Marušiak thinks that she did not want to complicate the situation for the government. “Overall, the way this coalition is governed and operated and intra-coalition relations are topical again. The way the government handles the pandemic is also problematic, “said the political scientist. He noted that he wondered if she would be willing to address issues of government social policy and social dialogue.

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Slovak politics is driven by the situation in the prosecutor’s office and the police in the investigation of corruption cases. According to the political scientist, these are extremely important issues of the rule of law and the legal certainty of citizens, and the President should address this in her speech.

“We will see if he wants to address this issue. It would mean a conflict with the government majority. Maybe he’ll try to avoid it. In that case, however, the report would be incomplete. On the other hand, it is a fact that, as in 1994, it is now questionable to what extent this government majority can work together and effectively manage the state, “said the political scientist.

According to Marušiak, the head of state might expect a speech from the head of state, as delivered by the then President Michal Kováč in parliament in 1994, who started the vote of confidence in the government of Vladimír Mečiar.

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“But I doubt that the president will be willing to do that. On the one hand, it has no other parties to which it in the parliament is close except for the coalitions. In addition, in 1994, a new parliamentary majority was formed in the parliament, which was able to replace Mečiar in office, “the political scientist noted. According to him, currently such a constellation does not work in the current national council, “although we may still be surprised and in the future the situation will require very unconventional political combinations.”

Last year, the President devoted much of the speech to the first wave of the pandemic. She appreciated that Slovakia managed it. It is now likely to evaluate the second wave, during which more than 12,500 people have succumbed to COVID-19.

Last year, she said, among other things, that we need a functioning rule of law that can ensure justice through the judiciary. She said we were witnessing trials of economically influential people who had relatives in justice and politics. “Developments in these and other cases of crimes against public officials and their affiliates will be a litmus test for developments from the post-communist era to the era of a strong rule of law,” the head of state said.