Archive of articles - August 1996, page 4

Making a name on a royal game

RIMAVSKÁ SOBOTA - For almost a century, one struggling south-central Slovak town has been building its name on a royal intellectual game: chess.Gasping under the weight of 25 percent unemployment - the nation's worst - Rimavská Sobota has gained recognition as a purveyor of the cerebral board game of queens and kings thanks to the local chess club. "Our town is called the Mecca of chess," Ján Keleti declared in his opening address to the approximately 700 coaches, players and spectators who gathered July 17-27 for the 1996 Junior European Chess Championships.Rimavská Sobota's chess club greeted the news that its city had been chosen to host the nine-day tournament with excitement. "I want Rimavská Sobota to mean something important in the world of chess," remarked 13-year-old member Miriam Keleti.

Volkswagen fourth among exporters

Dubnica arms factory tries to convert its production

At four o'clock on a Monday afternoon, the factory floor at ZŤS Dubnica, once Slovakia's largest arms producer, is empty and silent. A handful of blue-suited employees tinker with quiet machines while forges glow untended, and the tree-lined paths that weave between warehouses feel deserted. "In the past, there used to be two full shifts, sometimes three, working here," said ZŤS Personnel Director Milan Strapko. "You used to always meet people walking through the factory complex. But now there is mostly just one shift a day."

SNS considers leaving Slovak-Hungarian pact

Personnel recruitment companies vie for reputation

While the centrally planned economy had, with its overstaffed offices and overemployed workforce, little need for specialized services in human resource services, the picture is different now. There are over 20 personnel consulting firms in Slovakia, mainly based in the capital. Most often they provide staff recruitment and placements at different managerial levels, as well as various consultation services. "Generally, personnel departments of companies do not have the capacity to deal with the whole complex issue of human resources," said Lívia Osvaldová, director of Management Partners. "Besides placing employees, our firm helps to implement evaluation schemes, assessment centers and training programs."

VSŽ interested in Czech steel mill

Dobrofest promises good for the bad

TRNAVA - What do master guitarists John Fogerty and Mark Knopffler have in common with this western Slovak city? Their love for the dobro, a resophonic guitar that will command center stage at the fifth annual Dobrofest, running from August 26 to September 1 in and around Trnava. Although the tradition of the late-summer festival is relatively new, the passion the original Slovak-made instrument inspires is real. Knopffler's old band, Dire Straits, put a dobro on the cover of their mid-1980s hit album, "Brothers In Arms." And Fogerty of Credence Clearwater Revival fame once called the instrument, "mysterious" and "soulful." "Sometimes it sounds like a barefoot boy going down the dirt road to the fishin' hole," he went on to say. "Other times it's that impossibly beautiful woman that you can never have. In the right hands, as you will hear, it just doesn't get any better."

Mečiar accuses U.S. of using double standard

SDĽ dumps contents of Mečiar privatization pledge

Kováč's suit against Mečiar suspended

CONTROVERSY AT SLOVAK NATIONAL THEATER

...Despite internal disagreement

Yes, Slovakia needs legislation

he current demographic situation in Slovakia preordains our own future. The decline of the birth rate in Slovakia (since 1993 in particular) to a point below that which would sustain the current population level will have several effects in the coming years: a decrease in the population, an increase of the proportion of old people in the population as a whole, a decline in the productive proportion of the population, a fall in the number of taxpayers, and a shrinkage of markets. I assume that just as the Bishops' Conference feels responsible for Slovakia and its future, so the state and its representatives endeavour to provide the country with the best possible future in all areas of life.

Culture Ministry merges theaters...

Slovak miners' strike ended with beer

Energy Brigades hit near Mochovce

This summer, troops rolled through the west Slovak village of Starý Tekov. The young soldiers carried weather stripping, insulation, energy efficient lightbulbs - standard weapons in the war against energy waste. The group, calling themselves the Energy Brigades, pounded through the village pitching half-price materials and free labor to residents. Their mission? To promote energy conservation in this village of 1,600 just a few kilometers from the nuclear power plant under construction at Mochovce. "Rather than just protesting [against the plant], we wanted to give a positive example of energy savings," said Pavol Široký, the founder of the project. "We wanted to offer them an alternative."

Slovak abducted in Chechnya

Human resource companies wait for the privatization endgame

"Business is good," said Ján Necpal, head of the human resource company Neumann, as he smiled from across his wood desk in his top-floor office overlooking Bratislava's SNP square. But, almost in the same breath he added, "There is not that large a pool of customers in the Slovak market." The list of international service companies, such as human resource firms, in the capital is long. But they are not all here for the now. They are here for the future. The waiting game, the belief that investment in Slovakia will rise - has to - is the rallying cry of almost every international human resource firm in Bratislava.

RFE/RL to give police kidnap transcript