THE RULING Slovak National Party (SNS) has nominated Ivan Petranský, a historian with the national culture and heritage institute, Matica Slovenská, for the top post of the Nation's Memory Institute (ÚPN).
SNS chairman Ján Slota is convinced that the candidate will be elected as the new chairman of the institute arguing he is "clean and untainted by the past because he is young."
Petranský is the youngest of six candidates running for the post; he will turn 31 in August.
The election of the new ÚPN chairman should take place at the upcoming parliamentary session starting on January 30.
Besides Petranský, another strong candidate for the post is opposition Christian Democratic Movement's MP František Mikloško, whose candidacy is supported by all opposition parties.
The ÚPN collects, archives, and systematizes documents from Slovakia's totalitarian communist and Nazi puppet-state regimes.
