(Published on March 22, 2020)
by P. T.
As the tenth day has passed since Slovenia declared the epidemic of the new coronavirus, the government of Janez Jansa, which took over the business after that, has stressed the adoption of measures to curb the spread of the infection. On their website they also summarized the words of prime minister Jansa, who draws parallels with the medieval plague and the war for Slovenia.
“Today Europe looks like it was in the middle ages, with fears of the plague, walls and tolbooths at every step. They just didn’t have the internet. At present, we can only rely on ourselves and what we can produce, grow and collect from our own stocks,” the prime minister wrote about the current events.
He explained that they are trying to regulate the stoppages in freight transport and trade, and even the return of Slovenian citizens from other European capitals are a problem.
“But we can do it. After all, at the breakup of Yugoslavia, we had a war, closed borders, a loss of 80 percent of the market. But we quickly stood on our own feet and began to accelerate the lagging behind of the developed world,” he added, attributing success to patience, unity, knowledge, wisdom and courage.
After the most urgent steps have been taken to slow down and curb the epidemic of the new coronavirus, the government is also in the process of accelerating the preparation of the first major law package to help the population and the economy, they also wrote on the website.
Earlier today, they announced via Twitter that the government will discuss on Monday a proposal for a method and amount of pay reimbursement for companies that had to discontinue business in whole or in part. It will determine the manner of assessing the economic damage caused to economic operators and set out a general framework for compensation. Minister of labor Janez Cigler Kralj is expected to explain more details in an afternoon statement.