THE LEADERS of the coalition parties met on September 8 for the first time since Prime Minister Robert Fico stripped the Slovak National Party (SNS) of its authority over the Environment Ministry. SNS leader Ján Slota did not attend, saying he did not want to sit at the same table with Vladimír Mečiar, the head of the Movement for a Democratic Slovakia (HZDS), who had made some strong statements addressed towards Slota in an interview with the Sme daily, the SITA newswire reported.
With less than a year before parliamentary elections the coalition leaders agreed that they would no longer be bound by the coalition agreement signed in 2006 when voting on laws in parliament and that MPs can vote as they want.
“Support will be solved ad hoc,” Mečiar said, as quoted by the Pravda daily.
The party leaders also officially agreed that SNS will no longer be responsible for the Environment Ministry after their last nominee, Viliam Turský, resigned.
In spite of being stripped of the ministry and the problems between Slota and Mečiar, the SNS claims it is their priority to maintain the ruling coalition in its present shape, because “any turbulences would have a negative impact on the national economy”, according to SNS deputy chairperson Anna Belousovová, as quoted by SITA.
