Talks held on May 25 between the leadership of Slovakia’s ethnic-Hungarian SMK party and three dissidents within the party - Béla Bugár, Gábor Gál and László Nagy – did not yield results, according to Bugár, reported the TASR newswire.
Bugár further said that the party’s leadership was not prepared for the meeting and was not ready to agree to an ‘opinion platform’ being set up within the party. Bugár, a former party chairman, added that he is willing to take part in future talks, but it must be the leadership which proposes the initiative.
“We can attend talks but we don't intend to shut up and tolerate what happened last week via the media,” said Bugár, pointing to current SMK chairman Pal Csáky's description of Bugár, Gál and Nagy as a ‘platform of the offended’ last week.
Csáky rejected the notion that the party leadership had attended the talks unprepared. He also described the discussion as 'not very constructive' and noted that Bugár, Nagy and Gál were nervous at the meeting.
“We, on behalf of the leadership, submitted a specific written proposal of the text on platforms, which could get into the statutes,” Csáky told TASR, expressing readiness to take part in further talks.
Csáky also wondered aloud about how the three dissidents perceive the platform they want to set up. According to Csáky, Bugár wants his platform to bring in people from outside SMK as well. “I don't know whether there exists any precedent for this in the democratic world,” said a dubious Csáky. 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.
