By: UKOM
On Friday, Prime Minister Janez Janša was a guest on the “Kdo vam laže?” [“Who is telling you lies?] show on Nova24TV, in which he spoke about current domestic political issues.
The Prime Minister began by talking to the show’s host, Boris Tomašič, about the past year, which was marked by the COVID-19 epidemic and the Slovenian Presidency of the Council of the EU. He said that, due to the low vaccination rate, COVID-19 was still a problem this year, but a much smaller one given the high vaccination rate in care homes. Despite the epidemic, the Government had visited eight Slovenian statistical regions since September and spent a lot of time on coming up with solutions to the problems faced by the people, municipalities, the economy and institutions. “We have resolved hundreds, thousands of specific outstanding issues that we would not have otherwise resolved, because you can’t see that far if you stay in Ljubljana.” Asked about media coverage, the Prime Minister replied that the media’s job was to report on problems, but not solely on problems, and certainly not to cause them. “There are some “dependent media” in our country, I will call them that, which have a great influence on public opinion. They feel their mission is to cause problems, and they do it at a time when we are fighting an epidemic, they do it at a time when we hold the Presidency of the Council of the EU, they do it in a lot of areas where, in fact, they should be helping to resolve them by at least presenting both sides of Slovenia.” He added that nowhere else was there as much singlemindedness as in Slovenia. He pointed out that the real picture was different from the one seen on the screen, that many people, heads of institutions, care homes, schools, education centres and other institutions, were mainly concerned with how to solve things to make life better for the people. “The Government has decided to devote itself to this, to solving these specific problems, and that is what we are doing. We are very little concerned with the virtual picture of what is happening and the situation in Slovenia, we are dealing with real problems, we are solving real problems.” He added that figures were relentless and that it was possible to compare the results of this Government in less than two years with the results of governments in the past ten years, and when you compare them, you can see the difference. “You see how much capacity has been increased in homes for the elderly, how many bypass roads have been built or development plans put in place and funding provided, how much investment went into solving real problems for people and municipalities, and how many lump sum payments have been given to municipalities to solve people’s real problems”
The Prime Minister also spoke about the work of the National Assembly, about his coalition not having a majority, that it has 38 votes, and therefore for each decision, the votes of the representatives of the national communities and the deputies from some of the more constructive opposition parties are needed. “We mainly manage to get the votes, because we actually work for the people.” The Prime Minister said that one of major surprises for him was the opposition opposing the increase in net wages and the Long-term Care Act which would significantly benefit 100,000 people in Slovenia. He added that the implementation of the Long-term Care Act would cost roughly what the left-wing governments spend on propaganda through various channels and funding for their “militias at Metelkova 6 and other quasi-governmental organisations”. If the situation were reversed and SDS opposed such proposals, we would not survive a single day, such would be the stampede, the Prime Minister said. And this is also where the influence of dependent media comes into play. The Prime Minister also said the opposition fears the money would be spent on the people and not on their militias, and that they are also furious that a minority government, which has to negotiate for a majority, could pass an act that a left-wing government was unable to pass when they had a two-thirds majority. “It turns out it was not the case that they couldn’t do it, couldn’t vote it through, or didn’t know how to do it, it was that they didn’t want to do it. Because when you distribute the money, it is harder for those who made it, who actually need it, to take it and redistribute it to Metelkova 6.
The Prime Minister also spoke about the situation in the judiciary and drew attention to the Mayor Janković’s statement on Croatian television about having no fear of ever being convicted and sent to prison because he has always opposed the Slovenian Democratic Party and Janez Janša. He also drew attention to the political instrumentalisation of Slovenian trade unions and the statement made by Lidija Jerkič, head of a trade union, who said that the union was against the increase in net wage, although she could not explain why, but was against it anyway. He also mentioned the General Secretary of the Education, Science and Culture Trade Union. “It is obvious that this cannot be explained in terms of the purpose for which trade unions exist. This can only be explained by the fact that Ms Jerkič is meeting with opposition party leaders such as Luka Mesec and Tanja Fajon. Together, they are doing everything to bring down the government and prevent workers from getting a higher wage.”
Speaking about the demographic fund, the Prime Minister said that the legislative act is ready and that, if majority can be reached, it will be voted on this term, and otherwise in one year’s time.
Replying to the question on the success of the Slovenian Presidency in the Council of the EU, the Prime Minister said that, in spite of having less administrative resources than larger countries, Slovenia had to perform equally well and that it had closed more dossiers than Germany, which held the Council presidency prior to Slovenia. According to Mr Janša, the most important political achievement was that all 27 Member States agreed on how to handle the situation in Afghanistan, saying that the EU would help those who were directly endangered, because they helped during the NATO operation in Afghanistan. However, the EU would not open humanitarian corridors for all who would like to come from Afghanistan to Europe, as happened in 2015 after the Syrian war. “This is why we do not have the same situation at our borders as we had in 2015.” This was the basis on which Poland was able to take a position on the wave of illegal migrations from Belarus.
In his talk, the Prime Minister also touched on the delegated prosecutors. He stressed that some countries participate in this system, while others such as Denmark and Sweden, do not. However, there was no backlash over it in those countries. He said that Slovenia appointed a prosecutor to The Hague who rejected opening an investigation on the Iran-NLB affair, in which almost two billion US dollars of Iranian illegal money for financing terrorism was laundered. This is why it was in the interest of some people in Slovenia to send specific people who would investigate such matters and keep things under their control. He also discussed the affair involving the president of the Slovenian Supreme Court, Judge Masleša, saying that what was going on was only possible in an environment where justice is totally dependent on the mechanisms of the deep state. “The judiciary as we have it today is one of the key generators of injustice, destroyers of destinies, of lives, and also the cause of many accidents, personal tragedies in Slovenia, and I hope that the time will come when those who have brought this monster to life will be held accountable.” The Prime Minister also touched on the Constitutional Court’s decision to freeze the introduction of the recovered-vaccinated rule in the state and public administration, and the Supreme Court’s decision that those who do not comply with the measures in enclosed public spaces cannot be punished. Interest in vaccination declined after that, and new infections began to rise.
The Prime Minister also spoke about the upcoming year, which will also be an election year, saying that the Government has still a lot of work to do before the elections, including visiting three more regions. In the two years of its term of office, the Government will have visited all 12 statistical regions and solved hundreds of tangible problems. The Government has still a lot to do before the elections, and for the next term of office, it already knows exactly where investments need to be made, where investment injustices of the past need to be corrected and where development can be accelerated. He said that a real Slovenia exists and operates and that it is the reason that we have above average economic growth and a historically high employment rate. This also means that many more people are able to take care of themselves, there are fewer social transfers, more people pay pension and health contributions, more is generated and therefore more can be invested in the common good.
The Prime Minister concluded by saying that progress can only be made through cooperation, through the search for common interests, and not through exclusion, as emphasised by the KUL coalition. He called on voters to compare figures, achievements, the reality of the situation, namely their salaries, their allowances, their pensions, before making their choice at the polls. He said that we have already made up for the last year’s decline and that we have every reason to be optimistic about the future. He wished the viewers of Nova24TV a blessed Christmas, a happy Christmas season and a proud celebration of Independence and Unity Day.
Source: gov.si
