By: Gašper Blažič
EU Member States have until the end of August to submit the names of candidates for commissioners or members of the European Commission (EC), which serves as a sort of central European government. This means that the new composition of the European Commission will not actually be known until early autumn.
Given the current practices, prospects for the next five years do not look promising, as the president of the European Commission will remain the same, as will the composition of the coalition. During the past five years, the EC has often been a major instrument in the hands of the transitional left, as it has yielded to its propaganda: when a right-wing government was in power, Slovenia was always “problematic” at the European level. When the left returned to power, everything suddenly seemed fine, even though the situation was actually much worse. This is despite the fact that the European People’s Party (EPP), to which Ursula von der Leyen belongs, is the strongest group in the European Parliament and also at the level of the European Council. However, the mainstream within the EPP seems to be bloodless pragmatism, which is based on horse-trading. This is also evident in Slovenia’s recent history with the so-called “noble right” as envisioned by Milan Kučan.
Under Golob, the EC praises Slovenia
In any case, it is clear that the four MEPs from SDS are powerless against the majority in the EPP, as was evident even before the elections when the EPP nominated the incumbent president of the EC as its candidate, but SDS did not support her. Only the former foreign minister and now MP Anže Logar welcomed her re-election and has recently had several “dissenting opinions” within the party. Similarly, Matej Tonin (NSi) supports the old-new EC president, creating a position of double talk by saying, “We support Ursula, but we do not support, for example, the green transition,” even though it is clear that von der Leyen has clearly stated that she will insist on banning the sale of fossil fuel-powered vehicles within a few years. Just before that, she hid her positions, as it was initially unclear where she was seeking support for re-election. When it became clear that the liberals, socialists, and greens were ready to support her, she immediately broke off talks with right-wing groups in the EP. Thus, with a few weeks’ delay, the EC’s report on the “rule of law” was also made public, again targeting Hungary, newly Italy (due to Giorgia Meloni’s government), and praising Poland, where the “centrist” Donald Tusk is now in power. Regarding Slovenia, the report was critical – excluding the slow pace of Slovenia’s “green transition” – only in terms of judges’ and prosecutors’ salaries, as well as the financing of RTVS, which the government should support more generously. The EC report – presented to the public by the controversial EC Vice President for Values and Transparency, Věra Jourová, who will hold the vice-presidential position until the new EC is appointed – praised the progress in media freedom in Slovenia.
Brussels love the Socialist Alliance of the Working People (SZDL)?
It became clear from the context that the Peace Institute apparently left its marks in the EC report. If we look at who the sources of information were for the preparation of last year’s report on Slovenia, the picture becomes even clearer, so it is not surprising that the EC used such diagnostics that praise the new organisation and management of RTVS. Let us recall: the new RTVS law abolished the programming council, where the appointment of members was fairly open, as the national assembly voted on proposals from civil society – instead, they reintroduced a closed delegate system modelled after the SZDL, where pre-selected organisations appoint only “our people”. The Constitutional Court, as is known, initially suspended this law, but after Jourová’s visit to the president of the Constitutional Court, Matej Accetto, the suspension was suddenly lifted, leading to the “depoliticisation” of RTVS and the dominance of those who – in the words of Marcel Štefančič – are “f***ing more”. It is tragically ironic that the same Věra Jourová now presents a report that praises the organisation of RTVS while simultaneously demanding greater budgetary support for the public broadcaster RTVS, yet she cannot tell the truth about what she was really doing in Slovenia, despite being called upon several times by MEP Milan Zver to do so.
Eurobureaucrats defend the Gibanje Svoboda party
Among the noteworthy points in the report, another deserves mention. Brussels has recommended that Slovenia complete the supplementing of the rules on parliamentary inquiries, which would supposedly ensure the independence of judges and prosecutors. This means that the EC strongly supports the amendment to the parliamentary inquiry law recently passed by the National Assembly, although the National Council vetoed it. The amendment will significantly limit parliamentary inquiries, which pleases the president of the National Assembly, Urška Klakočar Zupančič, and apparently the EC as well. In other words, the ruling coalition has decided to severely limit the possibility of parliamentary inquiries, but only after the opposition managed to prevent a fairly transparent move by the Gibanje Svoboda party. The SDS had been advocating for the establishment of an inquiry commission for nearly two years but lacked the signatures of the NSi. Ultimately, the National Council voted to establish such a commission after numerous complications. Even then, there were complications, as Klakočar Zupančič wanted to block its establishment, claiming that it was necessary to check whether the establishment was in line with the constitution. The commission was eventually established, and the Gibanje Svoboda party forced its way into the leadership of the commission – a case of birds of a feather flock together until the SDS proved that the situation was contrary to the law. Then, Klakočar Zupančič suddenly and transparently acted to change the parliamentary inquiry law. The EC “blessed” all of this, claiming it was to protect the independence of the judiciary and the prosecution. Unbelievable.
Paper can endure anything
Apparently, paper can really endure anything, and until a few years ago, we in Slovenia harboured the illusion that Brussels would straighten out the wild transitional predators where we could not. It turned out that this is not true, and that the EC is actually a great ally of the transitional left, which has clearly shown its dominance and undermined the rule of law, while Brussels bureaucrats have friendly patted it on the back. Even when Prime Minister Robert Golob openly spoke on public media about how he would cleanse “Janšists”. “Secondly, we had high qualitative expectations. After all, we had a revolt of the entire judiciary against the disregard for constitutional court decisions. Political meddling in the police. Judicial palaces were unlawfully purchased, and money was also distributed to civil society. Conflicts of interest flourished. The ‘depoliticised’ television showed itself in all its glory. Media ownership became even more opaque, as did corruption and money laundering. There is no need to go on,” said lawyer and professor Matej Avbelj, who is also a columnist for Finance. He added: “Not only is the report largely fed from the mouth of a single Peace Institute, which, although there are three law faculties in Slovenia, is apparently the only credible source for the rule of law for the Commission. The report also blindly trusts our dominant civil society, which has openly politically engaged for the current government’s mandate. Its credibility as a reliable source is therefore zero.” As he further explained, since the time of J. C. Juncker’s leadership, the EC has become a political body that issues political acts written by officials with a clear value, certain policy, and perhaps even a political tendency.
What will follow in the fall?
As mentioned earlier, the EPP is deeply involved in this plot because its majority view prevailed that it is better to adapt to the left’s agenda in exchange for support from left-wing MEPs. This was ultimately evident in the exclusionary policies towards the group of European patriots and the fact that among the 14 vice-presidents of the EP, only five are right-wingers, despite the fact that the EP (again) is led by Roberta Metsola from the EPP. Therefore, it is not surprising that disappointment with the EPP is growing, not only among SDS voters and supporters, but also in debates close to the party’s leadership. However, mid-summer is not exactly the best time for decisions with long-term consequences, but in September, there will almost certainly be changes in the EPP, which could lead to a split or possibly a temporary status quo, as has happened in the past when the ruling Hungarian party Fidesz left the EPP after some consideration. Janez Janša’s speech in Bovec left the door open for possible changes regarding the status of the SDS in European politics. Nejc Brence later wrote on X regarding the content of the EC report: “This is exactly what we voted against in elections across Europe, but we got the same leftist European coalition that mocks the people with such reports.”
Věra Jourová in the new composition of the European Commission?
Given that the nomination of European commissioners is in the hands of individual EU member states, and that the Czech government has changed since 2019, when commissioners were last nominated, it is unlikely that the controversial Věra Jourová will be part of the next EC lineup. However, it is not impossible. Jourová comes from the party of former Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiš, who was succeeded by Petr Fiala. Since some countries believe that nominating a candidate is a matter of national consensus, it is not uncommon for governments to nominate existing commissioners again. In July, however, Jourová was not mentioned among the candidates in the Czech media. Whether the European left will still want to reward her with some position remains to be seen.
Grims: The European Commission supports the rule of the unelected in the field of public broadcasting
New European Parliament member Branko Grims commented on the developments in Brussels and the European Commission’s report at the end of July for Nova24TV. According to Grims, with the imposed game, in which the European Commission also supports the state’s stance, confirming the leadership of the public RTVS, which should be a television for everyone, not just for leftist NGOs—essentially government supporters—what happened is exactly what the legendary President of the German Constitutional Court and later President of Germany, Dr Roman Herzog, warned about many years ago during his visit to the Slovenian Parliament. He stated that he never imagined how deeply the claws of leftists would sink into public broadcasting under the guise of civil society, i.e., NGOs, and how biased such programmes would then become. “So, nothing new—the rule of the unelected, which was already criticised by the German constitutional judge at that time, is being realised again today and is proving to be destructive to any pluralism and to democracy itself, which is why it must be completely rejected,” emphasised Grims. “To claim that the current way of managing Slovenian public television, which has been completely subordinated to a leftist ideological concept, has contributed to its independence, is, of course, an obvious mockery of Slovenians and Slovenes, of citizens. And not only of Slovenians and Slovenes but of all citizens of the European Union, because this report is, in fact, intended for them,” he added, stressing that such policies must be ended and that, as mentioned, he will in no way support them.