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The president of DeSUS party, Karl Erjavec, did not attend the meeting of the presidents of the SDS, SMC, NSi, and DeSUS parties, thus preventing the consideration of the seventh anti-corona package, which, in addition to helping the economy as a result of the epidemic, also provides for a solidarity allowance for pensioners. It seems as he is more involved in completely different interests rather than caring for pensioners. Erjavec took over DeSUS with extremely weak political capital, as he only received 394 votes in the last parliamentary elections.
In the last parliamentary elections, when he ran in Tržič, Karl Erjavec collected a meagre 394 votes of citizens, which more than clearly proves that he does not enjoy public support. Numerous affairs during political engagement and empty promises around improving the situation of retirees have taken their toll. At that time, the membership was justifiably disappointed with the disastrous election results in the National Assembly election, to which the cooperation with Ljubljana Mayor Zoran Janković within Left Bloc undoubtedly helped.
“I am not satisfied with the result we achieved, I expected a better result,” said Karl Erjavec regarding the election results in the parliamentary elections, admitting that connecting with Janković was a mistake. “I know I could have done certain things differently during the election campaign,” he said. In addition to working with Janković, he also mentioned the emotional reactions at the confrontations, in which, in his words, unlike others, he was confronted with “some purely family matters”. In the campaign, DeSUS was “attacked from all sides, from left to right, and also the media was not the friendliest,” he said.
The European elections also failed
Despite the fact that citizens judged that Erjavec was not suitable for the role of the people’s representatives in democracy, the president of LMŠ party Marjan Šarec saw some potential in him, as he appointed him as Minister of Defence. However, this did not help Erjavec to succeed in the recent elections to the European Parliament. Namely, the party lost its seat in the European Parliament, where it had been so far represented by Ivo Vajgl, who did not decide to run as a candidate again. Thus, the party tried to recycle MEP Igor Šoltes, the grandson of the infamous Edvard Kardelj. Šoltes ran in the previous European election with his instant party Verjamem, meanwhile the central media played an important role. Despite DeSUS receiving 5.65 percent of the vote in the end, Erjavec said the result was not bad. In his defence, he told STA was that the party was at the border and “ran out of space”.
The return of Erjavec has set of the alarms of those who, despite the epidemic, want to be in power in every way. Seeing that the KUL project under the leadership of Jože P. Damijan, where they put their own interests before the common ones, is not in the least concretised, and even less feasible, Šarec made a move in the direction of reaching the goal that he has not been trying to hide, that is preliminary elections. After Šarec stated about Damijan that he sometimes behaves like a “vegetarian at a slaughter” and that he is not sure of his intentions, it became clear that Damijan no longer represents a lifeline. He also proved this on Tuesday morning, when he clearly wrote on Twitter that they wanted Erjavec in the position of prime minister in the LMŠ party. So they want a person who did not even manage to get into the National Assembly of the Republic of Slovenia, but would be excellent for the position of prime minister in such difficult time? Upside down world.
We could see how the way of working with Erjavec at the helm of DeSUS party looks like on Wednesday, December 16th, 2020. “Before each session of the Government of the Republic of Slovenia, there is a meeting of the presidents of SDS, SMC, Nova Slovenija, and DeSUS to coordinate open issues. Karl Erjavec cancelled his participation today (he did not even send a vice-president) and thus unfortunately made it impossible to discuss PKP7, where there are several open cases,” messaged Prime Minister Janez Janša via Twitter just before 19.00, calling out the irresponsible behaviour of the old-new DeSUS president. Namely, DeSUS merely sent a message that “President Mr. Erjavec announces that he will not attend the coordination meeting in the coalition, because tomorrow we will discuss the position of the DeSUS party in the coalition at the party’s bodies.” The message was sent on behalf of Erjavec by DeSUS Business Secretary Majda Glavonjič. Instead of successfully adopting PKP7, which would help health care, firefighters, transporters, with covering fixed costs of companies, facilitate the receipt of assistance and help the socially weakest, including young families and retirees, Erjavec pushed it aside.