Slovakia’s Speaker of Parliament, Pavol Hrušovský, officially set the date of the early general election for March 10, 2012, the TASR newswire reported, after the adoption of a constitutional law cutting short the current electoral term after parliament failed to approve changes to the eurozone's EFSF bailout fund in a vote on October 11 that was tied to a confidence vote in the government.
Later the EFSF changes were approved with votes from an opposition party, Smer, in exchange for the early election. The law on reducing the current electoral term by more than two years was signed by President Ivan Gašparovič on October 17. There have been two early elections in the past in 1994 and 2006.
The early elections will cost the state almost €10.15 million according to the organisation plan approved by the government. The biggest share of the sum, over €8.6 million, will be spent on the salaries of the members of election commissions. More than €1.5 million will be allocated to the Statistics Office for preparing the balloting and processing the results.
Source: TASR
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
The Slovak Spectator cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information presented in its Flash News postings.
20. Oct 2011 at 10:00
