By: Spletni časopis
Gibanje Svoboda party is demanding an immediate emergency session of parliament to cancel the referendum through which Levica and the SD attempted to score points ahead of next year’s elections by opposing their own government’s policy on increased defence.
Prime Minister Robert Golob allowed it to happen because he was counting on the opposition to block the referendum, so he would not have to get his hands dirty. But he miscalculated. Only Anže Logar and Eva Irgl came to his aid from the opposition. As a result, Levica and SD succeeded in stabbing him in the back by pushing for a referendum.
Now, to pull that knife out, citing the ambiguity of the referendum question, MPs from Svoboda, with the exception of Lena Grgurevič and Miroslav Gregorič, are demanding an emergency session of parliament, likely to be held as early as Friday, to cancel the referendum initiated by Levica during the passage of a government resolution that pledged to raise Slovenia’s defence spending to 3% of GDP by 2030. Urška Klakočar Zupančič ruled that the resolution, being a legally non-binding document, could be adopted before a decision was made on whether to hold a consultative referendum, which is itself legally non-binding. And so it was. Later, the government made even more ambitious defence commitments within NATO, going beyond those set in the resolution.
Despite all this, most MPs voted to call the consultative referendum, though it no longer relates to the already adopted resolution. That is why its content and purpose are now unclear, as was already pointed out by the National Assembly’s Legislative and Legal Service before the majority voted in favour of holding the referendum.
Yet the real aim was always perfectly clear: to score political points for the ruling coalition parties at the expense of the country’s international reputation and interests, by opposing the policies of their own government. Their own.
Even at the time the referendum was called, it was clear that those who favoured lower spending (Levica and SD) and those who supported increased spending, like the one Slovenia committed to within NATO, could both vote “against.” Notably, none of the coalition parties, including Levica and SD, objected to this commitment at the time it was made.
They later claimed they had “overlooked” what was decided in the government.
The Svoboda MPs now cite the unclear wording of the referendum question as the reason for convening an emergency session and cancelling the referendum, but this ambiguity was known from the outset and could have been addressed then.
At the time, however, they were still banking on the referendum not passing. Members of the coalition even boasted among themselves about how well they got along and how it did not matter that two of the ruling parties opposed their own government’s policy.
Levica and SD were clearly trying to gain pre-election points by opposing the government’s defence policy, which Svoboda tolerated because they expected the referendum would fail even if they did not support it, thanks to opposition votes. The bonus, they thought, would be that the opposition, SDS and NSi, would get their hands dirty instead.
But they were wrong. In the end, only Anže Logar and Eva Irgl from the opposition helped them.
The government parties had not anticipated this. The result was an almost panicked statement from Prime Minister Golob, who said he might propose a referendum on Slovenia’s withdrawal from NATO, though he has yet to follow through.
Now comes the proposal for an emergency session of parliament, likely to be rushed through by the end of the week, possibly Friday. Given Svoboda’s track record, it is clear that with their coalition partners, Levica and SD, they can do anything, anytime. The proposal is as follows:vprašanjePrenos
