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The wrestle to comprise political populism in central Europe typically seems to be like a recreation of “whack a mole”. No sooner is a lid placed on it in one nation than it pops up in one other. The newest instance is Slovakia, the place Prime Minister Robert Fico is implementing intolerant insurance policies simply as Poland’s new authorities is making an attempt to dismantle the conservative nationalist legacy of its predecessor.
In latest days, Fico has taken a swipe at Ukraine, deriding its authorities as a US puppet. His tradition ministry has introduced the restoration of ties with Russia and Belarus, suspended after the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine. Above all, Fico is urgent forward with plans to grab management of Slovakia’s judiciary, taking a leaf out of the books of Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s premier, and Jarosław Kaczyński, Poland’s former de facto chief.
Fico intends to dissolve a special prosecutor’s office that focuses on corruption and organised crime, and to scale back protections for whistleblowers. One obvious goal is to protect officers of Smer, Fico’s get together, towards investigations launched after its 2012-2018 spell in energy. Last week, the European parliament criticised the proposals in a decision handed by 496 votes to 70 with 64 abstentions.
Yet elsewhere Fico has pals. Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, was heat in his reward for him when he spoke final month at an end-of-year information convention. As for Orbán, he hosted Fico in Budapest final week and declared that the pursuits of Hungary and Slovakia have been “99 per cent in alignment”.
The flip to illiberalism in Slovakia dates from Fico’s election victory in September. This was a triumph for a politician whose profession appeared in ruins after the murders in 2018 of Ján Kuciak, a journalist who had been investigating Fico’s get together for corruption, and his fiancée. That episode threw gentle on murky connections between Slovak politicians, enterprise folks and organised crime. It impressed the nation’s largest anti-government protests because the fall of communism in 1989 and prompted Fico’s resignation after six years as premier.
Fico now leads a three-party coalition whose grip on energy will likely be strengthened if Peter Pellegrini, an ally who serves as Speaker of parliament, wins presidential elections set for March 23. Opinion polls put Pellegrini forward of Ivan Korčok, a pro-western former overseas minister, however the contest will go right into a second spherical in April if no candidate wins more than 50 per cent in the primary.
The presidency’s powers are restricted in Slovakia and different central European states however, as is obvious in Poland, they nonetheless matter. There, President Andrzej Duda has the precise to veto laws. On account of his sympathies with Poland’s former ruling get together, he’s striving to thwart the brand new authorities’s efforts to decontaminate the judiciary and different state establishments.
Zuzana Čaputová, an anti-corruption lawyer who has been Slovakia’s president since 2019, additionally has veto powers. But they depend for much less as a result of not like in Poland, the place the brand new authorities has solely a small parliamentary majority, Fico and his pals have sufficient votes to override presidential vetoes.
From the west’s viewpoint, Fico will not be as unreliable as Orbán in overseas coverage. He has not fully blocked Slovak arms provides for Ukraine. Although he says he would veto Ukraine’s entry into Nato, he helps its EU membership talks. Slovakia is a eurozone member, which locations limits on how disruptive Fico will likely be contained in the EU.
Rather, Fico’s priorities are primarily home. He desires to realize mastery over Slovakia’s political scene and he’s drawing from the 21st-century central European intolerant playbook to take action. In this sense, his comeback illustrates that the battle for liberal democracy in Europe is reaching a brand new peak of depth.
tony.barber@ft.com
