By: Vida Kocjan
Support for Alenka Bratušek’s (SAB) party is falling sharply, and opinion polls have long shown that the party will no longer enter parliament. It was similar four years ago. Then, in a panic and in the last moments, Alenka Bratušek collected some signatures (for what it is still unknown today) and at that time the members of the DeSUS party were strongly engaged in the field. Also, through some regional pensioners’ associations run by Desus activists (at least one is also a current candidate for parliament), members were urged to contribute their signatures. At the same time, it was heard: Let’s help her get to parliament. It took place in Dolenjska and Zasavje regions.
Nickname “Black Mamba”
The SAB came to parliament in 2018, by a fraction, and their president did not receive enough votes in two constituencies. She stayed outside and then waited a very long time for her five minutes. In the meantime, she also tried to persuade the very sick former mayor of Bohinj, but otherwise the SAB MP Franc Kramar to leave his parliamentary seat to her, as he is “sick anyway”. After his death, according to experts, the next morning, around 8 am, she called the parliament and asked which committees she would be in. Kramar died at night, so Bratušek’s nickname “Black Mamba” was adopted.
This year at DeSUS, at least for the record, they are no longer helping her. How could they since they also sank in the meantime.
The time of the government of Marjan Šarec
In 2018, Bratušek won a seat in the government of Marjan Šarec for both the party and herself. In just 16 months of running the country, the government’s results have been devastating. On January 27th, 2020, when Šarec unexpectedly resigned as Prime Minister, all his coalition partners at the time pointed this out. It was also confirmed that they were in strong conflict with each other. With the words “there are areas where we have not done much or almost nothing, the area where we have not done anything is healthcare”, Bratušek also confirmed this inefficiency. Šarec said that it was a government of extortion, and he and Bratušek already had a “problem at the beginning of his term”.
Drawing on European funds
It should also be recalled that the Ministry of European Cohesion Policy and Development belonged to the SAB, where ministers lined up. In a few months, it was Iztok Purič, then Marko Bandelli, and finally she forced Austria’s Angelika Mlinar. They even waited for her to get them a Slovenian citizenship in the meantime. Whereas the absorption of European funds at the end of the term (2020) was only 38 percent. Today it is 80%, with approved projects for full pumping in the coming months. Despite over 10 billion euros more money, which Janez Janša additionally negotiated for Slovenia in Brussels in the summer of 2020, there still will not be enough money. There are so many projects. The government has launched a new investment cycle worth almost 8 billion euros, with 2,416 projects being implemented in the country, of which 2,185 are co-financed with European funds.
Now she shouts: Public finances and retirees
Today, Bratušek once again promises and shouts that they will always be reliable to “protect public finances and retirees”. Let’s see what it is about and how it was.
We will work for pensioners: At the time when the SAB was in government, pensions were standing still, then Bratušek proposed that pensioners’ pensions be increased by 6.5 euros. “For 78 euros a year,” she suggested, saying that “it is a lot, and it shows.”
Fortunately, she no longer had the opportunity to shape the fate of pensioners, the new government under Janša’s leadership increased the guaranteed pension for 40 years of service from 530 to 620 euros or 17 percent. At the same time, pensions during Janša’s government, in two years, generally increased by about 13 percent. They have also arranged pensions for farmer insured persons, the disabled, war veterans and the like, but this is too much to list now. All that was previously “impossible”. The most vulnerable received three allowances and at the same time the so-called Draginja’s energy supplement.
Bratušek – Harmful to retirees
In June 2021, by voting in the parliamentary commission for the control of public finances, where KUL had a majority, it reached a decision to reduce pensions in the period 2022 to 2024! Fortunately for retirees, her proposal was not approved by the National Assembly. The coalition rejected this, and it still repeats exactly what it said then. That there is not enough money in the budget. That was refuted, and she is still talking about it.
Let us add that pensions are increasing only in the governments led by Janez Janša, in his (2004 to 2008) they increased by 24 percent in real terms.
Free public transport for pensioners
Bratušek shouts that her party will arrange free public transport for pensioners, high school students, and college students. Even with the introduction of free public transport in passenger transport, she falsely presented to the public that “she arranged it”. Similarly, the city now promises free public transport, although this is also regulated. It was regulated during the current Janša government.
Regional Hospital in Gorenjska
Bratušek promises Gorenjska region voters a regional hospital. However, she is keeping quite that this is part of the plans of the current government team, which has taken care of this within the framework of the almost 2-billion-euro law on investments in health care and has already provided money for construction. “She was happy to be in Kranj and work for her voters,” she said. She did nothing. Nothing!
She will fight for health care
She promises that the SAB party will continue to fight for a strong and accessible public health in the next term, their priorities will be to reduce queues and increase the number of family doctors. Let’s remember. On January 27th, 2020, she told the TV camera that her (Šarec’s) government had done nothing in the field of healthcare! Conditions for shortening queues have been introduced by the current government. At the same time, with the Act on Investments in Health Care, she also provided funds for increasing enrolment places at medical faculties.
What about economic indicators?
Bratušek is also misleading in this area.
Economic growth: In 2019, in the pre-crisis period, growth was 3.3%. In 2021, real growth was 8.1 percent. Slovenia is the first among the EU, euro area and OECD member states in terms of economic growth.
Data for the last quarter of 2021 show that economic growth in Slovenia was 5.4%, while the EU average was 0.4%. According to this indicator, Slovenia also ranked 1st in the EU. Some countries have even experienced a drop in economic activity.
Public debt in gross domestic product (GDP): In 2021, it decreased by five percentage points, from 79.8 to 74.7 percent of GDP. According to Eurostat, the average public debt of the 27 EU Member States was 90.1 percent. Slovenia’s public debt was thus 15.4 percentage points lower than the EU average or 20.6 percent.
For comparison. In 2015, the public debt was 82.6 percent, and the European average was around 83 percent. In 2015, Slovenia’s public debt was almost at the EU average. Today, it is more than a fifth lower than the EU average.
Unemployment: At the end of March 2022, Slovenia had a historically low number of unemployed. Only 60,534, which is the least so far in the history of an independent state. Unemployment is also declining in April 2022, with only 58,774 people left unemployed.
The credit ratings of the Republic of Slovenia have remained stable in the last two years. Stability shows that Slovenia is a solid and trustworthy country. The lowest credit ratings were in the period 2013 and 2014, when the government was led by Alenka Bratušek.
Below we publish graphics that prove what has been written.
GDP growth in 2021
Government debt in Slovenia and comparison with 19 euro area countries and 27 EU countries.
Slovenia ranks 4th in terms of the use of European funds, and in two years it has advanced from below average to one of the most successful.
Credit ratings of international credit rating agencies for Slovenia: The worst ratings were in 2013 and 2014, when the government was led by Alenka Bratušek.