By: Dr Metod Berlec
In the magazine Focus, we extensively summarise the resonant press conference of the Slovenian Democratic Party last Tuesday, where the president of the SDS, Janez Janša, and the European Parliament member Milan Zver presented facts (internal documents) that clearly reveal how the Commissioner and Vice-President of the European Commission, Vĕra Jourová, politically intervened in the decision of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Slovenia in the case of the disputed amendment to the RTV Slovenia Act. In February last year, the Constitutional Court considered the constitutionality of the RTVS Act and suspended the implementation of the disputed amendment. Shortly thereafter, Jourová visited Slovenia and also met with the President of the Constitutional Court, Matej Accetto. The Constitutional Court then changed its original decision (also under strong pressure from the ruling political party and dominant media) and lifted the suspension of the disputed amendment to the RTVS Act.
European MEP Zver persistently obtained internal documents from the European Commission regarding Jourová’s visit to Slovenia. Milan Zver stated: “It is truly incredible how much political bias and favouritism towards the amendment to the RTV Slovenia Act is evident from Vĕra Jourová’s documents. Therefore, it is understandable why these documents have been hidden for so long and why the third point of the reminder with President of the Constitutional Court Accetto is still covered. It is more than justified to suspect that the consequence of the intervention by the Commissioner for Transparency is the change in the Constitutional Court’s stance and the release of the disputed amendment to the law, which has led to complete political subordination of RTVS, personnel purges, and radical changes in the programme schedule. It is necessary to get to the bottom of this and ensure that this never happens again.” The entire affair clearly demonstrates the scandalous interference of a representative of the European Commission in specific constitutional decision-making in a member state. As summarised at the end of the press conference by SDS leader Janša: “They came to the Constitutional Court in the ‘province’ of the Republic of Slovenia to tell them to change this (suspension of the amendment to the RTVS Act). And the Constitutional Court did it. We are dealing with the fundamental question of the sovereignty of the state. Slovenia has not transferred this sovereignty to the European Union.”
THE SLOVENIAN DOMINANT MEDIA DELIBERATELY SILENCED INFLUENTIAL PUTIN SUPPORTERS AT THE VERY TOP OF THE SLOVENIAN TRANSITIONAL LEFT.
Another important issue that occurred last week is related to broader European events. There has been a lot of writing in both European and Slovenian media about alleged and real Russian agents across Europe. On some list, the above-mentioned politicians even found themselves because they gave an interview to the right-wing European news portal Voice of Europe, which, according to Czech investigators, is part of a broader “network of Russian influence on public opinion”. Of course, the absurdity is even greater because both Janša and Zver in these two interviews (and many others) strongly condemned Russian aggression against Ukraine and supported the attacked country. Janša was even the Prime Minister who, on March 15th, 2022, together with then Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and then Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala, was the first among European politicians to travel to besieged Kyiv. Together, they strongly condemned Russian military aggression and expressed support for the attacked country on behalf of their states and the entire EU. Janša even wrote a foreword to Thomas Cromwell’s book Why Ukraine Must Win, published by Nova obzorja. He emphasised that Ukraine must win because “unpunished evil always returns”. In short, the accusations were so absurd that they could not have been more so. However, the Slovenian dominant media rightly mentioned the extra-parliamentary party Resni.ca led by Zoran Stevanović, which is indeed pro-Russian, but deliberately ignored influential Putin supporters at the very top of the Slovenian transitional left. His awardees: the former party leader and first President of the Republic Milan Kučan, former President of the Republic Danilo Türk, and the Mayor of Ljubljana Zoran Janković.
The third thing worth mentioning here is the Saturday festival of the Gibanje Svoboda party in Zbilje, which was marked by technical difficulties and candidates gathered from all sides for their list for the European elections. It still was not known who would be the list holder, nor whether former President of the Court of Audit Tomaž Vesel (he himself did not know) was a candidate only of the largest government party for European Commissioner or of the entire coalition. Well, as it later turned out, it was again a solo action by Robert Golob (or his still right hand, Vesna Vuković, who, together with Vesel, now enjoys favour with the media tycoon Martin Odlazek), of which SD and Levica knew nothing. However, the Saturday festival showed that people with a totalitarian (Putinist) attitude toward the media are gathered in the largest government party. The cameraman of Nova24TV was not allowed to enter the “Festival of Freedom” …