By: Sara Bertoncelj / Nova24tv
“The finale of Slovenia’s presidency is becoming a kind of Brussels’ festival of praise,” the Delo newspaper’s correspondent from Brussels, Peter Žerjavič, wrote on Twitter, in response to the EU Commissioner for Justice’s praise for Slovenia. Meanwhile, the leader of the Social Democrats (SD) party and MEP, Tanja Fajon, made sure to balance things out by describing the current atmosphere in Slovenia as very bad, adding that politics has never before been so discredited. She added Slovenia to the list of “problematic EU countries” – but the EU seems to disagree, as praise keeps pouring in.
“The finale of Slovenia’s presidency is becoming a kind of Brussels’ festival of praise. This time, Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders praised Slovenian Minister of Justice Marjan Dikaučič for his recent achievements,” wrote the Delo newspaper’s correspondent from Brussels, Peter Žerjavič, who was clearly hurt by the fact that Slovenia received some praise. Given that he has continuously been reporting about how catastrophic Slovenia’s Presidency of the Council of the European Union supposedly is, he is likely to receive yet another award from the Slovene Association of Journalists.
“If I understand this correctly, Tanja Fajon is the only one left who wants to continue to sully Slovenia’s reputation,” Director of the Government Communication Office, Uroš Urbanija, commented on what happened, adding that even the Vice President of the European Commission, Frans Timmermans, sincerely praised the Slovenian Presidency, which is why Tanja Fajon‘s comments are all the more embarrassing. Namely, Timmermans said: “I commend the Slovenian Presidency, as it was because of the Slovenian Presidency that I was able to negotiate on behalf of the entire EU.”
This is not the first time that Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders has praised Slovenia’s Justice Minister Marjan Dikaučič – namely, he also praised him about a week ago at the EU-Western Balkans Ministerial Conference, when he also said that the two European Delegated Prosecutors from Slovenia had been appointed for five years. “We were discussing this for a long time – since the beginning of Slovenia’s Presidency – I talked about it with the Minister of Justice and the Prime Minister. I am very pleased that the two European Delegated Prosecutors from Slovenia have been appointed. This means that we now have delegated prosecutors from all participating Member States. The appointment is for five years, as was decided by the College of Prosecutors,” Reynders said.
Recently, Twitter users have been wondering where MEP Fajon has gone, as she has not expressed her concern for a while now. As it turns out, she was busy talking to the web portal politico.eu and its journalist Lili Bayer, who is – as is well known by now – Tanja Fajon’s main journalistic helper when it comes to criticising the situation in our country. “Engagement in both EU and domestic politics is an advantage because I have a broader picture,” Fajon said, who conveniently forgot to mention that her appearing in the European Parliament is more often an exception than it is the rule. She assessed that the Presidency of the Council of the European Union went smoothly at the technical level, but that opportunity for anything more was lost. “We have not been able to improve the reputation of our country,” said the politician, who did her best to sully her own country’s reputation on the European soil as often as possible. “We are not proud of the disrespect of the law in the case of the Slovenian Press Agency and the prosecutors, nor the insulting rhetoric towards foreign colleagues, diplomats, and journalists,” she once again repeated her usual complaints, and also added Slovenia to the list of “problematic European countries” on Twitter.
In an interview with politico.eu, it was also mentioned that Fajon has every chance to become the next Prime Minister of Slovenia. So, she made sure to promote herself while trying to sully the reputation of her own homeland again. Of course, she also made sure to accuse the current government of creating “a very bad atmosphere” in the country. She pointed out the anger and apathy among the voters, adding that politics has never before been this discredited. However, she conveniently forgot to add that the parties of the so-called Constitutional Arch Coalition are actually the ones who behave in the most exclusionist way, but she did point out that restoring trust in the institutions will be a challenge for any new government. If the remnants of the transitional left had not been set up in the institutions, this mistrust might not even have occurred in the first place, but it is certainly not Fajon who could restore the public’s trust.