By: Peter Jančič (Spletni časopis)
In a mafia showdown, a car was riddled with bullets in Ljubljana. Despite police efforts to conceal details, the media reported that Satko Kekić was murdered. Kekić had previously served time in Bosnia and Herzegovina for drug trafficking.
The justice system in our country does not pose a real threat to criminals. They are left to kill each other. The police will not even disclose the names of deceased criminals – it is prohibited. However, the police denied that Kekić was a protected witness for the prosecution in ongoing cases (which have been dragging on) against powerful and influential mafia groups from the Balkans.
We still have not learned who set fire to a judge’s house in Dolenjska or which Balkan country the perpetrator came from. Meanwhile, our plainclothes police officers, armed with pistols at their waists and resembling Balkan mafiosi, took drastic measures against retirees in Celje. These retirees were protesting against the politically motivated judicial proceedings targeting Janez Janša, who has been wrongfully imprisoned multiple times by judges. The latest instance was just two weeks before an election in which he was the frontrunner – until the judiciary sidelined him.
As new elections approach, we all know how perilous this period can be.
RTVS harshly condemned retirees protesting judicial abuses for allegedly attacking their journalists. However, no RTVS journalists were present at the protests, and the station did not even report on the event. Two technicians who ended up at the protest by accident – en route to another assignment – were advised by the police to park their RTVS-marked vehicle among the protesters. These were people who are also protesting against RTVS abuses. Coincidence, or something else?
Eventually, it emerged that neither the technicians nor their vehicle were harmed, and the police did not file any charges related to an attack on RTVS staff. Still, RTVS spun the incident in a manner as outrageous as the narratives often propagated by activist Nika Kovač and her March 8th Institute. Their portrayal of the event was absurd, especially compared to the time when photojournalist Borut Živulović ended up in the emergency room with a smashed face during protests against the previous government, Vladimir Vodušek’s camera was destroyed, and numerous police officers were injured. Back then, RTVS did not protest the brutal attacks on journalists. Instead, they invited one of the organisers of that violence, drug dealer Anis Ličina, to speak on camera, where he casually remarked: “You just put on a vest, anything labelled RTV, and they quickly avoid you.”
RTVS had a cozy relationship with the anti-Janša protesters. They supported and advertised them. But these current protesters? They are the “wrong” ones, so the narrative is spun differently, with the conflict exaggerated into something that hardly qualifies as an attack on journalists.
RTVS later apologised for enabling Ličina’s incitement to violence against journalists but never explained why they put a drug dealer – rumoured to have financed anti-government protests – on camera. Those protests were reportedly supported by traffickers whose businesses were disrupted by the previous government’s stricter border controls, which hampered drug and human trafficking.
The current government and Ljubljana’s mayor, Zoran Janković, take a more lenient approach. Prime Minister Robert Golob even poses for photos with Janković and Milan Kučan at a café that is infamous among informed locals for its connections to figures like Ličina – the kind of “special” Balkan.
All this unfolded as the court sided with former police director Boštjan Lindav, who had been a victim of Robert Golob’s political purge. The court found that the new police commissioner, Senad Jušić, lacks the qualifications to lead the police force. It was already known that Jušić had no experience managing any significant operations. However, Interior Minister Boštjan Poklukar responded to the ruling by stating that the court had not annulled his decision or dismissed Jušić, meaning he could remain in his position. Jušić’s appointment is yet another example of the principle: “It does not matter if they are competent, as long as they are one of ours.”
This saying originated during the selection of directors at RTV Slovenia, where similar purges and appointments of loyal, unqualified personnel have occurred under the current government. These appointees fail to cover protests adequately, yet claim protesters attacked journalists who were not even present.
The lack of professionalism has reached such levels that even a state inspector fined RTV Slovenia, then led by Zvezdan Martić (who later resigned), for appointing high school graduates to leadership positions.
If someone competent were truly running the media outlet, their vehicle would never have driven into a group of protesters. Rational police leadership would also have ensured officers did not advise them to park there. Fortunately, in Celje, unlike previous incidents in Ljubljana, journalists were not harmed, their vehicle was unscathed, and no participants were prosecuted for attacking a media outlet – even though undercover police officers in civilian clothing were mingling among the retirees and observing everything closely.
For intimidation, some individuals were visibly carrying pistols tucked into their belts in a manner reminiscent of Balkan gangsters. Whether they were actual firearms or something else, the image they projected was unmistakably threatening – like something out of a mafia scene. Video footage shows their behaviour was far from gentle, even towards elderly women.
The only person who truly faced consequences in Celje was protester Drago Bobnič, who was fined €855 for public indecency and disobeying an official. Footage captured by the retirees, however, showed undercover officer Matjaž Bratina behaving, at least seemingly, in a highly inappropriate manner. Moreover, he was not in uniform, so protesters had no way of knowing he was a policeman. For all they knew, he could have been another Anis Ličina – a figure with government and RTVS connections, involved in drug trafficking, showing up to suppress dissenting voices.
The police protested against media outlets naming participants like Bratina, claiming such actions violated privacy. However, as a public official acting in a public space, Bratina is neither an anonymous mafioso nor exempt from scrutiny.
This situation reinforces the long-standing perception that the authorities, police, and judiciary are not focused on tackling serious crime, protecting prosecutors, or safeguarding judges. Instead, they prioritise the political persecution of right-wing politicians and the harassment of their supporters who protest against abuses of power and judicial overreach.
Actions that are permitted in free societies.
Judicial misconduct tied to political conflicts is not a fabrication. Numerous failed prosecutions against Franc Kangler, aimed at destroying the SLS party, serve as evidence. Which they succeeded in doing. Numerous trials against Janez Janša, during which judges have already sent him to prison twice through staged judicial processes, were orchestrated to secure power for the left, which had appointed the majority of judges to the highest positions.
However, they did not manage to destroy Janša.
Even in the judiciary, political leaders occasionally appoint top officials based on the principle that it does not matter whether someone is qualified, as long as they are “one of us” and will serve their political goals – fighting opponents and protecting their allies. This approach echoes practices from the socialist era. The Constitutional Court unanimously overturned all verdicts in the Patria case, citing a lack of substantive evidence. It also ruled that the trial was unfair because Judge Branko Masleša did not recuse himself. Masleša was elected by the left as a Supreme Court judge and later as the president of the Supreme Court, even though he had not passed the bar exam in Slovenia. Under the previous regime, he served as a judge and a Communist Party official. Supreme and Constitutional Court Judge Jan Zobec pointed out the irony: lawyers with qualifications from Bosnia and Herzegovina are not even allowed to enter the Supreme Court building.
For this critique, Zobec was condemned by the judicial organisation as acting unethically, and the Supreme Court was unwilling to review his complaints. However, the Constitutional Court annulled this decision because the President and Vice President of the Supreme Court, Damijan Florjančič and Miodrag Đorđević, who had previously initiated proceedings against Zobec, participated in the judicial decision-making process. Like Masleša, they did not recuse themselves from proceedings in which they were personally involved.
“Honest” judges. Our “honest” authorities.
This troubling picture becomes even more alarming when considering that, this week, MPs from Svoboda, SD, and Levica deliberately hindered the Court of Audit’s work for the upcoming year by cutting its budget. This institution examines government spending, prompting the entire leadership of the Court of Audit to protest. The cut followed the auditors’ daring critique of Finance Minister Klemen Boštjančič and other ministers for improperly using state reserves to purchase a decaying building on Litijska Street and of Minister of Culture Asta Vrečko for unlawfully gifting over €8,000 to Svetlana Makarovič.
The Court of Audit refused to fall for the ruling coalition’s and its media allies’ manipulation, which blamed lower officials and the opposition for decisions involving state funds, claiming the government had no role.
Now, auditors have been punished for their integrity – making it easier for public funds to be misused.
This week, the ruling parties in Parliament also deliberately and blatantly violated parliamentary rules, the so-called “little constitution” of the National Assembly, to fast-track the distribution of substantial pension privileges to favored cultural figures, a practice reminiscent of the old communist regime that generously rewarded its own at the expense of the majority.
Violating rules in Parliament – the institution that sets laws and should therefore be the first to respect them – seems normal to these parties because they hold the majority. Just as it seems normal for the General Director of Police to uphold the law yet be appointed through its violation. And in the case of the Police Director, it is not the officials at fault.
The blame lies with the leaders: Prime Minister Robert Golob, Minister Boštjan Poklukar, and, in the National Assembly, Speaker Urška Klakočar Zupančič for undermining the rule of law.
All of this reflects the ruthless subordination of state institutions, which should remain neutral, to political parties, by appointing unqualified individuals. It also represents the continued suppression of media and oversight institutions, as well as the opposition in Parliament.
The ruling parties aim to secure their grip on power for the future at all costs. In this power struggle, nothing is sacred – not rules, not laws, and certainly not manners.
This week, members of Svoboda even openly declared that the judiciary is part of their political power and should not be criticised.
They seem to seriously expect that the judges they have appointed will, for the third time, imprison Janša if it appears he might once again take power – a possibility that current indicators suggest. Or at least help neutralise him.
If the U.S. could not take down Trump?
The next strike may come with the Trenta case, following JBTZ and Patria – targeting one of the foundations of Zoran Janković, Milan Kučan, and Robert Golob’s power.
Meanwhile, in the country, young men with pistols on their belts chase down pensioners, mafia clashes occur, and judges’ properties are attacked. Justice Minister Andreja Katič (SD), who bears primary responsibility for the safety of judges and citizens, shifts the blame amid all this chaos onto the opposition for not remaining silent when their leaders are unjustly imprisoned and harassed.
They even dare to protest against injustice. Can you imagine?
Outrageous!
And this, apparently, is the greatest problem for the judiciary and the state: Janša and pensioners.
Is all this turning our country into a mafia state? No.
It is primarily destroying the state and its future.
The authorities, including the judiciary, do not even threaten the mafia and crime. At most, the mafia takes care of its own, occasionally gunning someone down.