All five of Slovakia’s opposition parties – Ordinary People and Independent Personalities (OĽaNO),the Christian Democratic Movement (KDH), Most-Híd, the Slovak Democratic and Christian Union (SDKÚ) and Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) – on Wednesday, January 9, submitted a joint proposal to convene an extraordinary parliamentary session to debate the Jozef Čentéš case. Speaker of Parliament Pavol Paška is obliged to convene the session within seven days.
The opposition parties would like President Ivan Gašparovič to appear at the session in person and present his reasons for refusing to appoint Čentéš, who was chosen by MPs in a June 2011 vote which the Constitutional Court later ruled wholly legitimate, as general prosecutor, the TASR newswire wrote. The KDH, SDKÚ, SaS and Most-Híd have already begun collecting signatures for a parliamentary proposal to launch an impeachment process against Gašparovič for alleged deliberate violation of the constitution in the Čentéš case. Their efforts could be stymied, however, as the fate of the initiative depends on the ruling Smer party, which controls a majority of the seats in parliament and has already announced its intention to back the president.
Gašparovič has told Prime Minister Robert Fico that he himself is considering coming to parliament to explain his reasons for not appointing Čentéš, TASR reported, citing government spokesperson Erik Tomáš. Gašparovič's appearance before parliament would render an opposition-initiated special parliamentary session on the Čentéš issue groundless, Tomáš said. Speaker of Parliament Pavol Paška remarked that the president is informed about each parliamentary session and has the right to attend whenever he sees fit.
Gašparovič decided not to appoint Čentéš on Wednesday, January 2, citing several reasons for his decision, all of which have been challenged by the opposition parties.
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.
