By: Ana Horvat (Nova24tv.si)
After European Commissioner Věra Jourová’s visit to the Constitutional Court of Slovenia, the European Commission needed additional time to prepare a report on her visit, as the content was “extensive.” But now, finally, the report has been made public and, as MEP Milan Zver noted, the Radio-Television Slovenia Act was also discussed, although this was not the subject of Jourová’s visit. What is striking about the document, however, is the anonymisation of almost the entire document, which raises doubts about the transparency of the visit, which is why Zver will now formally request the publication of the entire document. Given that this is information of public interest, we have also requested the notes on the Commissioner’s visit from the Constitutional Court.
“Of the six pages, five are anonymised, and one is visible. The last paragraph more than obviously shows that the amendment of the Radio-Television Act was also discussed, despite Jourová’s claims to the contrary,” MEP Milan Zver wrote on Twitter, who will formally request the European Commission to make the rest of the report public. Namely, the Commission has published a report on the content of EU Vice-President Věra Jourová‘s visit to Slovenia, but almost all of it is anonymised, and one of the entries suggests that the Radio-Television Slovenia Act was also one of the subjects of discussion.
“Today, in response to my request to the European Commission to publish documents related to the visit of Vice-President Věra Jourová to Slovenia, the European Commission has published the “mission report”. Of the six pages, five are anonymised, and one is visible. The last paragraph more than obviously shows that the amendment of the Radio-Television Slovenia Act was also discussed, despite Jourová’s claims to the contrary. I will now formally request that the European Commission publish the rest of the reports. The public has a right to know what “their” representatives are doing in the name of the rule of law,” MEP Zver wrote.
As the report published on Twitter by Zver clearly shows, the Radio-Television Slovenia Act was also one of the topics being discussed. The following is a quote from the last paragraph on the first page of the report, which says: “[…] Finally, he (the President of the Constitutional Court of Slovenia, Matej Accetto) remarked that he sees a growing trend of trying to translate political problems into legal cases that are put forward to the European Court of Justice or national constitutional courts. In his view, this increases the perception of politicisation of the judiciary, because whatever the decision, it will most likely be divisive.” It is worth noting that Jourová visited the Slovenian Constitutional Court at the very stage of the Court ruling on the Radio-Television Slovenia Act, which was adopted by Golob’s coalition with the intent of taking over the national media outlet. And it was Jourová’s past support for the left-wing government that indicated that something was going on behind the scenes. When MEP Zver asked for a report on the visit, the European Commission asked for ‘extra time’ to prepare it, which was another reason to question the correctness of her visit.
As the public deserves to know what the content of the conversation between the European Commission Vice-President and the President of the Constitutional Court was, we also addressed a question to the Constitutional Court, namely: “The visit of the European Commission Vice-President Věra Jourová to the Constitutional Court provoked a heated public reaction, especially as she visited the President of the Constitutional Court, Matej Accetto, at the very stage of the decision-making process on the Radio-Television Slovenia Act. Given that this is information of a public nature or in the public interest, we ask you to forward the notes of the visit, as the content of the discussions between the two is still not known and has not been clarified.” We will publish the reply when we receive it.