A new political party to represent the interests of Slovakia's Roma community has been established as the Party of the Slovak Roma Union (SRÚS) was registered with the Interior Ministry on November 30, 2010, the party's plenipotentiary and chairman of the Slovak Roma Union, František Tanko, told the SITA newswire on January 5.
Tanko said the party would be introduced to the public next week. He did not specify whether the party will operate at the local, regional, or national level. According to the register of political parties, members of the new Roma party include Alexander Farkaš and Eva Farkašová who are also members of the Slovak Roma Union.
The director of the Milan Šimečka Foundation, Laco Oravec, who specialises in minority rights issues says that establishing new parties will not help representatives of the Roma community in Slovakia achieve better success. He said that he keeps his fingers crossed for every Roma who wants to enter politics but he is concerned that this is only a
dead-end street without a chance for success.
Oravec said a better option than founding new parties is involvement of Roma members in already established political parties operating nationwide which are more appealing for Roma than strictly Roma parties. Tomáš Hrustič of the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs told SITA that its survey from 2005 showed that most Roma voters support majority political parties.
Source: SITA
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
The Slovak Spectator cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information presented in its Flash News postings.
