By: Dr. Vinko Gorenak
Yes, a lot of things are happening with the Social Democrats (SD), especially if you follow them over the last three decades. A few days ago, a court victory was announced over Janez Janša around the so-called stolen villa in Ljubljana, which now houses the SD. Of course. Anyone who knows what a “late judgment” means knows that there is still a long way to go from here to the High Court, the Constitutional Court or the ECHR, which will never be successful for them, but for daily political needs, to them favoured tycoon left wing media with national TV, which we all pay for, published this as a great victory of the SD over Janez Janša.
SD is, not only in real estate, the successor to the Communists
Younger readers probably won’t even know what social property is. This was once a notion for the property of all citizens, but they were actually, like the state, run by the Communists. This also applied to today’s building of the National Assembly. Today a single building was divided into two parts before 1990. The first one had an entrance from today’s Šubičeva ulica (today the front of the National Assembly), where the former assembly, today called the National Assembly, was located. On the other side, on the side of Tomšičeva ulica (today the last entrance to the National Assembly), the communists lived. You will not believe that there was no passage between the buildings at all, they only build that after the independence of Slovenia, so today there is a well-known slope.
Well, if the communists were the only ones in power in 1990, then we switched to a multi-party system and it would be decent for communist real estate in Ljubljana and elsewhere (including part of today’s parliament on Tomšičeva ulica) to be inherited by all newly formed political parties. But this was not the case, the former communists, today the SD, declared themselves the sole heirs to the property of the former communists. Thus, the “owners of half of the building of today’s National Assembly” remained, but they “exchanged” it for the villa of the murdered jew on Levstikova ulica 15 in Ljubljana, which was forcibly taken (stolen) from the former owner, Moskovič. The social property of all of us was “exchanged” for a private villa, in a socialist way, which was nationalised to Moskovič after the war or, in real words, stolen by the then communist authorities. But the SD owns even more real estate, which it “inherited” from the former communists.
Miran Potrč and distancing from the communists
In the 2008-2011 parliamentary term, I was a parliamentary associate with the well-known Miran Potrč, then an SD MP, otherwise the last president of the Communist Assembly (now the National Assembly) during the one-party system. For him, the current President Borut Pahor said that he was the greatest comrade in the time of socialism and the greatest gentleman in the time of democracy. Pahor’s words are perhaps more understandable today than they were ten years ago. Of course, the MPs of the right political pole, including me, often teased Miran Potrč that he belonged to the SD, i.e. the successors of the former communists. Potrč always reacted rather sharply and quoted a declaration from 1996, which was adopted at the SD congress, or its predecessor ZLSD (United List of Social Democrats), with which they distanced themselves from the former communists and their actions. At that time, of course, we did not believe him, but a resolution is a resolution, Miran Potrč never worshiped communist criminals like Fajon, Židan and Koprivc do, so in my eyes, given his age, he remains a gentleman.
The proud successor of the communists, Marko Koprivc, arrived
But watch out, a bit over a year ago, Tanja Fajon, the head of the SD, Dejan Židan, the former head of the SD, and Marko Koprivc, a radical member of the SD, gathered in front of the monument to Boris Kidrič in Ljubljana, one of the greatest communist criminals. They laid a wreath there and bowed to him. In the National Assembly, Marko Koprivc said something like this: “We are the proud successors of the League of Communists…”. Thanks to Koprivc for actually disclosing the facts. The SD party is therefore the proud successor of the Communists. I hope that the elderly Miran Potrč did not watch this video, otherwise his health condition could deteriorate, which I certainly do not want.
Brigita Skela Savič and her hypocrisy
Brigita Skela Savič is proud of her doctoral degree. Many are convinced that she has a doctorate in medicine and that she is a doctor. But this is not the case at all. She is a nurse who just got her doctorate. The said lady recently published a call for Friday demonstrations on November 12th, 2021. Imagine a nurse with a doctorate posting a call for unreported protests at a time when our hospitals are suffocating with Covid-19 infected patients. No wonder nurses and doctors who work with Covid patients with superhuman efforts distanced themselves from her actions. The culmination of any impudence, however, came the day after from the said lady, who called on the government to close the country completely. So first the call for demonstrations and the spread of the virus, then the call for the government to close the country, did you understand this impudence?
Tanja Fajon is not worried
Well, Tanja Fajon is not at all worried about what Brigita Skela Savič, a prominent member of the SD, is doing. Judging by the SD message, she even supports the call of Brigita Skela Savič. Imagine. Tanja Fajon supports unreported protests against the government. However, with her public statement (response to Brigita Skela Savič’s call for protests), SD MP Jani Prednik “irresponsibly” spoke up. There are a few others like him in SD who do not want to perform in public, of course I know them, but the real question is when their voice in SD will be silenced, I do not believe they would hear it.
In conclusion
So in SD they are mostly hypocrites. When they want to be the heirs of the former communists, they legally enforce it, when they want to distance themselves from the communists, they do so with a resolution, which the proud successor of the communists Koprivc literally marches over, but when Brigita Skela Savič calls for protests, they support her in SD, and in the background remains the reasonable Jani Prednik, who condemns the actions of Brigita Skela Savič. No, no, ladies and gentlemen, this is the defence of the past and the former communists, just join the path of the future already. We in the SDS did this 30 years ago.
Dr Vinko Gorenak is a State Secretary in the PV Cabinet, a former Member of Parliament and Minister of the Interior, a university professor and a member of the SDS.