ACCORDING to Ján Slota, the leader of the ruling coalition Slovak National Party (SNS), the National Memory Institute (ÚPN) could lose its status as an independent institution and be shifted under the authority of the Interior Ministry.
According to Slota and PM Robert Fico, the coalition partners did not discuss who would become the ÚPN's new chairman at a September 18 coalition board meeting.
The SNS was originally interested in the vacant ÚPN post but later decided to withdraw its two candidates, Peter Bielik and Adrián Kucek.
Slota now says that "the SNS does not care particularly about this institute", the Hospodárske Noviny daily wrote.
Fico added that "compared to the tasks that lie ahead of the government, the ÚPN is an absolutely minor matter".