SLEEPING WITH PENGOVSKY

All Work And No Play Make Pengovsky Miss Out On Two Posts

Pengovsky is working on Meeting of European Capitals’ Mayors taking place in Ljubljana today and tommorrow, hence the lack of posts these past two days. Sorry 🙁 I know you miss my fabulous political analysis and in-depth, behind-the-scenes and off-the-record information.

Well, at least Friday Foxies are still on schedule 😉 Sleeping with Pengovsky should be back to normal as of Monday.

BTW: LAST CALL for any and all who want to join in on the Liberation day hike around Ljubljana on Saturday. Pengovsky will start around 8 AM at KT 1 (Agrotehnika Gruda, see this post for details), but you can join in anywhere on the circuit. No live blogging this year, though 🙁 The proper equipment is out of order…

Committee for Protection of Human Rights

The good doctor often says that Slovenian independence was not won by a handful of individuals, but by the people of this country. Obivously, the whole thing would have not gone as smoothly as it had, had it not been for a perfect blend of a clear-headed communist leadership, fervent, vocal but nevertheless rational oppostition and brave, resolute and civil people who sensed that a lot was at stake supported the process of democratisation as such, not neceserily always agreeing either with the communist leadership which was gradually relinqushing power or the oppositon which was getting ready to take power.

70.000 people demonstrating in support of JBTZ, demanding a fair trial and use of Slovene language (photo: Tone Stojko)

The so called “Slovenian Spring” started in earnest on May 31, when Janez Janša (yes, the guy) was arrested for allegedly being in posession of a top secret military document. This was the straw that broke the camel’s back. As Ali H. Žerdin, author of Generals Without Hats, a brilliant book about the period, notes, the masses were ready and were waiting for the signal. And as luck would have it, four people of very different walks of life we arrested, starting the JBTZ trial (Janša, Borštner, Tasić, Zavrl – a very good beginner’s guide on the trial is here).

Janez Janša, David Tasić, Ivan Borštner and Franci Zavrl moments after the trial ended (photo: Tone Stojko)

Immediatelly, a “rescue operation” was mounted and it took the shape of Committee for Protection of Human Rights (Odbor za varstvo človekovih pravic), headed by Janša’s long time friend Igor Bavčar. But it soon became obvious that the Yugoslav army, the only true force still holding Yugoslavia together was not just on a show-of-force mission, but was dead serious about trying, sentencing and locking up these four people for high treason. And the Army wanted to do it in Serbo-Croatian. This was reason enough even for people who intentionally stood out of politic’s way. Language is one of the few things on which Slovenes agree most of the time and as far as the Army was concerned, it all went downhill from there. People were out on the streets, repeating a simple demand: A fair trial in Slovene language. As Žerdin later noted, it rarely occurs that such a simple idea has such devastating consequences.

Ordinary citizens throwing flowers at the feet of conscripts guarding the military court in Ljubljana (photo: Tone Stojko)

To commemorate this rarely seen unity of Slovenians and to give credit to everyone of hundreds of thousands of people who either took part in demostrations or became members of the Committee, who – to put is simply – were there when it mattered, to all those a web museum named Slovenska pomlad is being set up (Slovene only, I’m afraid), but if you happen to be in Ljubljana one of these days, a “real-life” exhibition opens today at Mestni Muzej Ljubljana (Ljubljana City Museum).

Believe me, it’s worth a look…

Workers of the World, Unite!

Last year, Jean was asking about Billy Bragg’s version of The Internationale. This is it, methinks.

The struggle is constant and the race is long. But if we are to make headway, love has to be spread both ways. So if you work for somebody, remind him or her that you’re a part of the success – but don’t overdo it. It was, afterall a team effort. Alternatively, if you are an owner or an employer (or both), remember that you hired those people for a particular reason and that while you bear the brunt of responsibilities, sucess is greater when shared.

You can see that workers’ participation in profit sharing is a big issue in Slovenia this year, can’t you? 😉

BUSTED: TV Slovenia Claims Mayor Janković Will Run For Parliament

There’s only one problem. He won’t.

Given the fact that mayor Zoran Janković and his list of city councilors are the only non-parlamentarian political force in Slovenia to be reckoned with on the national level, his continuously rumoured running for parlimanetnary office in autumn is frequently the topic of choice for journalists and pundits all over Slovenia. Despite the fact that Janković has continuously denined any such future move.

The title reads “Jankovič Will Run With Another List” (source, if not already changed)

Now, why would they run a story like that? Because they skipped class when sense od humour was being handed out. In the video you’ll see Janković give a straigth answer to a journalist’s question about whether he’ll run or not. And after Zoki takes a jibe at the press, pengovsky (smart as ever) decides to light up the mood and asks “what about any other list?”. A valid question, but it wasn’t meant entirely seriously. And neither was the answer:

Everyone got it. Except for RTV SLO webiste, where the team probably spent the afternoon asking themselves how could it be that noone else picked up the story. We’ll I’ve got some real news for you guys: It was a joke! Lighten up And stop transcribing verbatim what everyone else says. Use your own head!

Slovenia Votes 2008 Badge

I realize that Slovenian elections may be of little to no interest to anyone but me and some other hard core freaks. But thought it’d be a kindda neat thing to do, so I created a badge representing the latest poll results in the ongoing election campaign.

The badge will only display the data for the decided vote and will for the moment be based on the assumption that SD, LDS and Zares will form an opposition (left wing) bloc while SDS, NSi, SLS and DeSUS will continue in their existion coalition and will be joined by SNS. Lipa, for the moment, remains out there somewhere.I realise it’s kinnda nerdy, but if you like, you can put the badge on your blog/site as well by copy/pasting the following code

 
<a href="https://www.pengovsky.com/category/elections-08/">
<img border="0" src="https://www.pengovsky.com/sloelec2008.png" /></a>

Badge is 180 pixels in width and 235 pixels in height and will change every time I publish results of a new poll to reflect the latest numbers. Depending on coalition relationships the compostition of both blocs may also change as may the graphics itself. But the dimensions will remain the same.

Showdown At OK Sečovlje

Remember Joško Joras? A group of people organised into movement 25. Junij (June 25th) yesterday led what they called a peaceful march for a fair border between Slovenia and Croatia.

Janez Podobnik (left, 2004) and Marjan Podobnik (right, 2008) provoking at Slovene-Croatian border

In case you don’t know, the litlle fleck of land Joško Joras calls home is only accessible by a road between Slovenian and Croatian border checkpoints at Sečovlje border crossing. Even more, it is on the disputed piece of land, claimed by both Slovenia and Croatia. The latter enforced its claim by blocking the road with cement flower pots and today’s march was called under a pretext of removing these pots, following an order to do so by Piran District Court.

Now, you have to understand that since both countries claim sovereignity over this land, there is a regulat tug-of-war between various institutions. Croatinan district court in Buje thus orders the road to be closed, while Slovenian district court in Piran then rules that the closure is illegal and orders pots to be removed. And so it goes on forever. Croatians are – truth be told – slightly better in this enterprise, mostly because they have direct land access to Joras’s land and can therefore engage in a multitude of tricks, whereas Slovenian options are limited – neglecting the fact that Croatia really wants to achieve a fait accompli, whereas Slovenia opted not to hit below the belt and plays the long game.

Anyways. Morons of 25. Julij today wanted to (and I qoute) “enact the ruling of Piran Distric court” and remove those pots. Which is all fine and dandy, unless a) it is paintfully obvious that this is a very very lame excuse to try and provoke a border incident and b) that the law cannot be enforced by a mob.

Leader of 25. Julij is – you won’t really be surprised – Marjan Podobnik, brother of Janez Podobnik, minister of enviroment and former president of SLS. Now, Marjan himself was president of SLS in the second half of the 90s but he spectacularly fucked up and was sent to political oblivion. Or so we thought. Some six months ago he formed movement 25. junij (the date of Slovene independence) and it was immediately obvious that shit is about to hit the fan. Namely, the Podobnik Bros. have an unhealthy relationship with that particular piece of the border and Joško Joras. Four years ago, only days before the elections Janez Podobnik went “to visit” Joško Joras, tussled with the Coratian police and caused an international border incident. And yesterday, his brother Marjan gathered a mob of 200 people, went to remove those fucking pots, tussled with the croatian police and caused an international border incident. Am I the only one seeing a pattern here?

If you want to see the tussle, click here, scroll to the end of the article and press play.

The whole thing disgusts me and I think Podobnik (Marjan, this time around) deserves a proper bitch slapping. Creating an international incident to score cheap political points is crazy (oh, he maintains that the whole thing is apolitical. Yeah, and I’ll vote SDS in autumn). Abusing a member of your own party to do so (Joras) is despicable. And finally, claiming that the rule of law is at an end since Slovene police won’t let them camp in for the night is just criminal.

And just to remind you – this is not the first case of mob justice in this country. Remeber Ambrus and the Strojan Family? Precisely the same mechanisms were at work yesterday. The fact that this government rode to power on a wave of xenophpby, nationalism and even racism, gives a carte blanche to Podobniks and the likes (Slovenian readers will appreciate the wordplay, no?) to go about serving justice as they see fit.

EDIT: in the comments, crni validly points out that Slovenian police removed the protesters once their Slovenian permit expired. I’m not saying that the entire state apparatus is in on serving mob justice. By “this government” I mean the actual political body and the political parties it consists of.

Oh, and – don’t forget – today is 27 April. Today Slovenia celebrates the formation of the Liberation front in 1941. Detailed info here, this year let me just announce that I’ll be doing the Liberation Day Hike on May 10th and you are welcome to join in.

Smrt fašizmu, svoboda narodu!

SNS Sets Sights On Coalition As The Prez Addresses Parliament

A new edition of Politbarometer, a more or less monthly check-up of public opinion polled and published by Public Opinion and Mass Communication Research Centre revealed what has a Ninamedia poll a month ago detected: that Zmago Jelinčič and his SNS are on the rise. This time around they took the third spot, which should ring alarm bells all over the political spectrum.

NOTE: for unknown reasons Politbarometer failed to detect Sašo Peče’s Slovenska Lipa. It only cites 1% of the vote under “other”. For reasons of continuity I put that result in Lipa’s column.

According to this poll SNS is the only party on the rise, which is bad bad news especially for the left bloc, because it means that the canmpaign will acquire an increasingly populistic tone. But it is even worse news for the right bloc, because it is now clear that Janša’s attempts to take over SLS and NSi votes have resulted in driving the voters of these two parties over to SNS, suddenly making it a force to be reckoned with. But this also sheds a whole new light on possible post-election coalition arangements. So far we’ve only compared two easily identifiable blocs: SD, LDS and Zares (left bloc) versus SDS, SLS and NSi (right bloc), with other parties playing a side role. At the moment this gives us the following division of the decided voters (note that as much as 39 percent of voters remain undecided) :

If we now indulge in some political mathematics, we are presented with two options. ONE: Call it a true left/right split. In this scenario SD, LDS, Zares and DeSUS form a completely left wing coalition and enjoy a comfortable 6 percent lead over the right bloc. TWO: The ruling coalition is extended to include Jelinčič’s SNS and in this scenario we are faced with a split down the middle, which – some claim – is the natural state of Slovene politics.

Translated into reality (with some help of electoral mathematics), this would mean that a left-wing government would enjoy a small, but managable majority in the parliament, whereas a right-wing government would have a mininimal majority, possibly having to rely on the votes of minortiy deputies, which traditionally vote with the government.

There is another element, however. Today, President Danilo Türk addresses the parliament on the issue of the Constitutional Court, which is subject to increasing political pressures as well as burdened with an exponential increase in cases. Türk – whose yesterday’s speech to the European Parliament has won international acclaim – will most likely strike at the core of the issue and possibly shift the focus on the debate to some elementary problems this country is faced with – the independency of the judicial branch being chief among them.

Pengovsky’s projection: Which of the two scenarios will occur mostly depends on which party gets the most votes. If Janša’s SDS tops Pahor’s SD, then the second scenario is much more likely to happen, as Janša will (as he should) do anything in his power to continue running the country. However, the Prez’s speech might stir the pot just enough to add some real content to the election campaign and force the parties to take a stand with or against the proposed issues, and – by extention – with or against the President himself.