Janez Janša | SLEEPING WITH PENGOVSKY

Get Me The President (Of The Parliament)!

It is against the backdrop of Phone-hacking scandal, the impending suicide of America’s public finances and the inherent inability to EU leaders to stop digging themselves into a Greek hole, that the Slovenian political crisis is unfolding in its own peculiar way. The government (or rather, the coalition) is only semi-operational, but is trying to mask this by hyperactivity. The opposition hasn’t got a clue what to do after if will (presumably) take power, but is trying to mask this by churning out amateur-night recovery plans. And the parliament is in shit-how-do-I-get-re-elected-mode, but is masking this by declaring a summer break.

Pavle Gantar, soon to be ex-president of the parliament (source: The Firm™)

After Zares quit the coalition and Gregor Golobič and Majda Širca returned to the parliament to serve as MPs (ousting Cveta Zalokar Oražem and Vito Rožej respectively) a rather unique situation was brought about in which the President of the Parliament was a member of an opposition party. Pavle Gantar of Zares was elected to the post as a result of a coalition agreement and since Zares quit, it is only logical that he should vacate the post toute-de-suite. Really? Not so fast. Initially, there was some level of confusion over this, with Gantar reportedly not committing to resigning while Golobič was already announcing it. Whether or not both top Zares men were of different minds is at this point almost irrelevant as Gantar only a day or so later announced that he is resigning as President of the National Assembly (the parliament), effective 1 September this year.

President of the Parliament (similar in function to Speaker of the House in US Congress and UK Parliament) is nominally the second-most senior elected official in the country. If for some reason the President of the Republic is incapacitated or otherwise unable to perform his duties, the President of the National Assembly steps in to take over in care-taker capacity until a new president is elected. All in all a powerful position, even if we neglect the usual separation of powers blah-blah such as the fact that the President of the National Assembly swears in all judges of the lower courts and so on. In short, being the top dog of the parliament is not exactly peanuts.

Which is why Gantar’s resignation created a lot of hoopla within the coalition (or rather, what was left of it). Whatever hopes Prime Minister Borut Pahor might have harboured about Zares not being entirely serious about quitting the coalition, these have now crumbled into sun dust. Even though both Gantar and Golobič maintain that the move was purely a question of political hygiene, the fact remains that the ruling Social Democrats led by PM Pahor now have another hot political potato in their hand. True, Zares MPs have woved to support whomever SD put forward for this position, but at the very least the parliament is up for yet another super-heated all-encompassing debate in September, one which is bound to raise levels of adrenaline and bad blood in the Slovene ecosystem even further. And there’s no shortage of either to begin with.

It all has to do with the epic #fail of the government on super-referendum Sunday last June. Just prior to the vote on pension reform, PM Pahor was making unmistakeable noises about requesting a confidence vote should the reform be defeated. But after the referendum defeat, these noises became increasingly muted and after it became obvious that Pahor in fact backed down from his political machosim it was a question of political credibility for Zares and Gregor Golobič (who resigned as minister days before that fateful referendum) to complete the cross-over to the opposition. Having done that, both the party and its president, proclaimed all but politically dead by some long ago, seized the initiative and are – for the time being at least – calling the shots in Slovene politics.

This, of course, will not last forever. But a number of things are working in Zares’ favour at the moment, not the least of them being the nonsensical hyperactivity of the government and its president, going about just everything, from health reform to solving the Greek debt crisis and everything in between. It is obvious that most of this is just smokescreen, trying to hide the fact that Pahor’s government is in retreat on all fronts and trying to cut losses. Case in point being the much-hyped law on media, which failed spectacularly at the very first stage of the legislative procedure by means of an orchestrated effort to kill it by (at least) a part of MPs for Social Democrats.

No need to go into too much detail (maybe some other time) but suffice it to say that a particular media baron wannabe had a particular interest to see the law killed as soon as possible and had apparently struck a deal with (at least par of) Social Democrats, to vote the law down, even though the government had approved the text of the law. The thing is that even though the MPs gave the man what he wanted, most of them will be outside of the parliament looking in some time within the next 16 months. But currying the favour of media owners is one thing (slightly OT: pengovsky predicts the SD will get screwed and that the favour will not be returned). It is quite another thing to sort out your own ranks and this is where PM Pahor is going from strength to strength in failing to do just about anything. The Capital Assets Management Agency is still going rogue, to the point of the PM actually calling in the anti-corruption commission to investigate, the project of Bloc 6 of Šoštanj Coal Power Plant just about got out of hand with costs now exceeding 1.3 billion euros (original estimates put the price tag at around 600 million) and the government still lacks four full-blooded ministers.

Add to this the urgent need to elect a new president of the parliament, possibly a referendum on the family code and you see that the situation is in total flux. Amid this a quiet by rather fast re-positioning is taking place. As said earlier, Zares is making the most of this and Gregor Golobič – having purged the party’s parliamentary group of unwanted element – is suddenly way more visible than he ever was as a minister. On the other hand of the spectrum, the Slovene People’s Party (SLS) distanced publicly flipped the bird to Janez Janša and his SDS, saying they will address voters by themselves and not via some astroturf initiatives.

These moves may seem innocent enough and it remains to be seen how the big parties (SD and SDS) will respond. Will SD get their act together and will SDS be able to stick to the point once for a change and not go on all-out rampage? The September vote on the new parliamentary chief will be a good measure of things. At any rate, the fun and the drama are not ending any time soon.

Slavoj Žižek vs. Gregor Golobič: 20 Years After

Pengovsky slacked on blogging yet again this week. Not that there’s no shit to report (this is where David Suchet goes: “Au contraire, mon ami!”) but there’ll be plenty of time to do that. However, it is only fair and just that some content be put between meat and tits and as far as opportunities go, you could do worse than Thursday’s debate betwixt the post-lacanian philosopher Slavoj Žižek and leader of Zares Gregor Golobič.

Žižek, Pelko and Golobič (photo by yours truly)

This post is not really a summary of the event. It is, rather, a series of thoughts that pengovsky would have uttered out loud were there a Q&A session. Luckily, however, there wasn’t one which means you, my dear readership, get to bear the full brunt of the storm, the only silver lining being that although moderator Stojan Pelko (until recently No. 2 man at the ministry of Culture) kept the debate going for a good two hours, pengovsky wasn’t taking notes for most of the time so whatever thoughts I may have had on several issues, they are now long gone.

Revolution

That the debate took place on 14 July is, of course, no coincidence. Žižek noted that revolutions (or any other social and/or political upheaval for that matter) can only be thought in hindsight and that the mother of all revolutions prevailed as late as two hundred years after it had started (in 1989) only to be defeated utterly and completely in the following twenty years. Bizarrely so, this is exactly the amount of time it took the 20th century to go from one revolution (or clusterfuck, depending on your point of view) to another. Doubly so for Slovenia, go Žižek and Golobič.

However, there’s a catch, sayeth yours truly. Until the 1988-1991 period of formation of Slovenia, revolutions tended to follow the out-with-the-old-in-with-the-new approach. But the 1988-1991 revolution (because in hindsight(!) that is exactly what it was) was performed by more or less the same group of people who partook in the 1968-72 social and student unrest in Slovenia. OK, give or take a few, but in general the statement stands. Could it be, that a revolution was “stolen”? Performed by people who had already had their go?

On one hand it is kind of hard to just say that, especially because it ended all-right. But on the other hand (and this connects to the next issue), there is this nagging feeling that 1989 was just a continuation of 1968. And that in fact it was not just a Slovenian version of the “European spring of nations” but rather a culmination of a much longer process which in fact took everyone (including those who would end up on top) slightly by surprise.

Capitalism

Secondly, both Golobič and Žižek were extremely harsh in their critique of capitalism. How can it be that the problems of capitalism are being solved by the very tools which caused the problems in the first place? Indeed, Golobič warned that Europe is being slowly but surely disassembled and if the trend continues, we will be lucky to escape another round of bloodshed this continent had seen way too much in its turbulent history. In this respect Golobič went after the recently published platform of Janez Janša‘s SDS calling it the same old neoliberal nonsense they fed this country during their stint in power. In fact, the platform as it stands now, is anything but neoliberal. It is a handbook of economic alchemy which would on one hand lower taxes, increase public investment and decrease budget deficit, whereas on the other hand aims to introduce (by amending the constitution, no less!) a thoroughly communist concept of ownership being both right and obligation with everyone contributing to the common good according to their ability. Sounds familiar? Thought so…

In short, rather than taking us down the neoliberal road once again (which is what Golobič fears) SDS’ economic platform will – if implemented – destroy what little potential for economic recovery this country has regained in the past couple of years. Thus, Golobič is wrong. We shouldn’t be afraid of neoliberals. It’s amateurs we should fear.

And while we’re on the subject of neoliberals: pengovsky thinks that in this case Golobič somehow chose to ignore the big picture. Yes, solving crisis of capitalism with even more capitalism will inevitably lead to disaster. That this disaster is most likely to take the form of a more or less global conflict (I won’t use the word “world war” but feel free to think it) is almost a given, especially if one looks back at the history of the 20th century. In this respect Golobič is dead right. But criticising capitalism at this point is like kicking a dead horse. The moment for radical changes in world economic order was missed sometime in the second part of 2009. The situation we have today is not the result of capitalism in pre-crisis neoliberal form raising it head, but it is because no sensible alternative was provided. This seems a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy, because people who were in position to provide an alternative did not do so because their main impetus was to get back to the “business as usual”, although there is no longer anything usual about any business. But given that the world is so interwoven economically there is probably no way to just drop everything and start afresh. We might come to that. In fact, Golobič is correct when saying that everything that was done to solve the crisis just deepened it further and that bloodshed is almost unavoidable. But asking to – well – cut to the chase and getting it over with is perhaps asking a bit too much.

So, what do we need? Naively, pengovsky proposes a Slovenian “space programme”. Not in the “sending-a-man-to-the-moon-and-returning-him-safely-to-the-earth” kind of way, but a far-reaching programme or initiative that would have positive side-effects which may in the long run prove to be even more crucial than the project itself. One thing that comes to mind is the introduction of universal basic income, which although his party toyed with it at first, Golobič dismissed as a noble but unattainable idea in a recent interview. That may be so (although some serious calculations would be in order), but pengovsky is willing to bet that just by initiating procedures to completely revamp the system of social security, a lot of positive stuff could happen. What is needed here is some outside-of-the-box thinking, just for the argument’s sake if nothing else.

More state, less homeland

Universal basic income is of course an utterly anti-market idea. Neolibs tend to have a fit whenever they see something being state-ordained. That the state would cash out equally to everyone is of course their worst nightmare. That the state rarely becomes leaner after neolibs tinker with it, is something we’ll conveniently neglect. But as we said, while Janša may tinker with neoliberal ideas, Milton Friedman and the faithful would probably scoff at Janša’s economic legacy and die of shame reading his economic plans. However, all the buzzwords are there. The lean state. The tax cuts. The pro-business environment. And the homeland. In fact, Janez Janša summed it all up in a recent reply to the good doctor on Twitter, where he said that homleand is priceless and doesn’t collect taxes. State is a legal framework, homeland is the content. And concludes that Žižek is mixing apples and oranges.

Making a fool of everyone present

What was it Žižek said that upset Janša so much? Well, it was in fact one of his usual rhetorical bravuras which sent everyone into a frenzy. Namely, the pop philosopher said that he fears Janša’s notion of more homeland and that this country needs more state and less homeland. This was predictably followed by a hefty round of applause. Similarly, at the very beginning Žižek countered those who label Golobič smart and corrupt, saying that he always thought of Zares leader as an honest but slightly stupid person (cue laughter). Sure enough, these and other soundbites had the intended effect: headlines were full of them the next day and Žižek was again lauded as the master of wit. However, what most of those present failed to see was that these rhetorical twists were only a manifestation of what Golobič said a bit later on, that the society today has no opinion leader and that on the whole people tend to follow rather than seek new paths. As if he had read the infamous Despair.com poster which says that “left to themselves, people tend to imitate one another”.

Žižek again showed how easy it is to take control of the masses, no matter if the mass is comprised of people who thing of themselves as critically minded individuals. In his most excellent book Generali brez kape (Generals Without Caps) jouralist Ali Žerdin recounts how Žižek did something similar twenty-odd years ago when Janez Janša (then still an obscure scribe for Mladina magazine) was imprisoned in 1988, sparking popular protests which became focal points for all sorts of grievances Slovenes had against socialism and which started a chain of events which ended with Slovenia declaring independence three years later. Namely, Žižek was speaking at a gathering of the Human Rights Committee and said that the Communist Party was always using catch-phrases like “the time for words is past, now it’s time for action!” and that in his view showed that the Party had a legitimacy problem which it attempted to cover up by its hyperactivity at that time. So, Žižek proposed that the Committee hit the Party where it hurt and stated that “the time for action is past, now it’s time for words!”. Those present erupted in cheers and applause. But then Žižek delivered the final blow: “I must say I’m sort of embarrassed that you feel for a cheap trick like that” he said. Apparently many a face turned red.

Twenty years later we still have the same problem. Too many people fall for too many cheap tricks like that way too soon. And this, in pengovsky’s view is the ultimate lesson of Thursday’s Žižek vs. Golobič. Not whether leader of Zares is a credible person. Not whether capitalism is in it’s dying moments. Not even whether there will be blood. The lesson is that throughout the last twenty years the people of this country still count on someone else to take the hard decision and then criticise them for it from a comfortable distance, all the while falling for the same trick over and over again, learning practically nothing. Increasingly, the feeling is as if we’re stuck in 1991.

At Some Point, Hanging In There Makes You Look An Even Bigger Loser

Pengovsky showed some time ago that chances of early elections being called in Slovenia are about two to the power of 2079460347 against. Nearly everyone is competing in who will issue a more urgent call for early elections, but when a push comes to a shove, everybody’s got some other business to attend to. Like running the country. Keeping the parliamentary seat. Pointing fingers. Or even crowd-sourcing. Anything but calling the damn elections.

(source, of course)

Exibit A

Prime Minister Borut Pahor was on the telly ~~yesterday~~ Tuesday evening, where he said, for example, that he came to the conclusion that his resignation would only push the country deeper into political crisis rather than bring about early elections, so he chose to continue as PM. He also said that a new round of discussion on pension reforms is to take place, despite the fact that he and his government received an epic beating in a referendum on pension reform a month ago.

He is also about to take over as acting minister for Public Administration instead of Irma Pavlinič Krebs who resigned her post and will be formally relieved next week and he is already facing unrest in the public sector unions. As if that wasn’t enough, the PM recently trekked half-way around the world to India to find a buyer for the limping national airline Adria Airways, is dealing with the Greek financial crisis and has recently confabulated with opposition leader Janez Janša on how the political future of this country. A tall order by any standard, but when compared to the PM’s low ratings and mounting credibility issues, it become obvious that the PM’s ego issuing checks his body can’t possibly cash.

Anything to stave off the elections, apparently.

Exibit B

Of all the voices calling for early elections, those in Janez Janša‘s SDS are among the most vocal. Indeed, there are also at least two sort-of-grass-roots campaigns probably aimed at expanding the breath and appeal of the largest opposition party. One group, calling themselves Active Citizens Group headed by sociologist Matej Makarovič (who among other things was the first president of SDS youth organisation) is positioning itself as a think-tank for the political right and is citing the do’s and the dont’s for SDS and sister parties in order to win elections. Another group, headed by SDS Ljubljana city councilman Žiga Turk is (was?) collecting online signatures to call early elections. To date they collected some 19,000 signatures which – although not a smallish number – is way below anything that could make members of this group gurgle with excitement.

Altough both groups try to present themselves as grass-roots movements, they are anything but. Both of them boast former ministers as leading members, some of whom are speculated to return to the cabinet if and when Janez Janša wins elections. But apart from a slight transparency issue this is not really important.

What is more than obvious is the fact that – just as the ruling coalition – the opposition has a general credibility problem which it is trying to rectify by generating “civil society” clamour for a change at the helm of the country. Namely – if all were well and good in this world, the opposition would win the next elections without breaking a sweat, especially with as unpopular a government as we have now. However, the polls show that Janez Janša’s overall strategic objective of winning 50+ percent of seats in the parliament will remain wishful thing. Which is why he needs a credibility boost. Ad-hoc civil society support groups are one way of doing it.

A more effective way of gaining some credibility is by presenting a viable election platform. Which is exactly what the SDS did yesterday. Or did they? Well, not really. What they presented, was actually a draft platform, a patchwork of ideas some of which sound more plausible than others. Just a teaser: on one hand, the SDS would (predictably) lower taxes dramatically while increasing infrastructure investments on the other but it would also put a ceiling in public debt to 45% of GDP (currently, Slovenia’s public debt is at 38% percent of GDP).

That this platform is a work in progress is also shown by the fact that SDS is crowdsourcing ideas on a dedicated website. This is not the first time they resorted to this trick. In fact, even while still in power, Janša’s government launched a site that sought people’s views on the future of Slovenia. Little came out of it. Ditto for a similar site launched by the incumbent government. And, just to further make the point, Ljubljana branch of SDS made the same move, releasing draft platform six months before elections and crowdsourced input with limited success.

Six months ago Janez Janša announced the need for the Second Republic. Just as the notion was starting to fade, he announced a draft election platform. Neither is anything to write home about, so it is safe to assume that both were primarily aimed at creating buzz rather than substance, although yesterday’s document offers several concrete although self-conflicting measures.

Point being that SDS made precious little progress in terms of preparing for elections. Given that their motion to change the constitution which the parliament is debating right now actually decreases rather than increases chances of early elections, the conclusion is that Janez Janša is in fact in no hurry to get to election day.

Exibit C

Two MPs for Zares quit their party group yesterday and switched to independents. Vili Trofenik and Alojz Posedel were the odd men out almost from the very start, not in the least because they often departed from the party line, most notably on the question of mayor/MP conflict. This brings Zares’ MPs down to seven, making them a slightly less of a force to be reckoned with, although they are still the third most powerful party in the parliament.

Bleeding votes is never a good thing, regardless of how Gregor Golobič tries to play down the move by both MPs. But in all honesty, the switch was at least suspected if not outright expected, not just because Golobič is back in the parliament, making a nuisance of himself to everyone who had it fairly easy, both within Zares as well as in other parties (case in point being Golobič’s entry into the Twitter-sphere, where he immediately made waves).

It mostly has to do with the expected lifespan of this parliament. Posedel and Trofenik have no interest to see it come to a premature end as their chances of getting re-elected are (save a political miracle) practically zero. So parting of ways was imminent.

Verdict

We are nowhere near elections. Even if the PM ties a confidence vote to the budget rebalancing act in September and loses, elections are possible in beginning of December at the earliest. And it seems that the more necessary the confidence vote is, the less probable it is becoming. Until yesterday, the minority government of Borut Pahor had merely thirty-three votes in the parliament (SD and LDS). It could more or less count on two out of three votes of the independent MPs. Now, that count is up to four. This means the count now goes up to thirty-seven, making it nine short of an absolute majority. Adding two votes of minority MPs, this can be further extended to 39 and with that PM Pahor suddenly has enough wiggle room to make it all the way home, since both opposition SLS and SNS (five votes each) have declared their opposition to early elections. In addition DeSUS of Karl Erjavec also has zero interest in early elections, which means the primer minister is in the position to shop for votes on any given vote.

The only problem is that this is no time to play political games and spend energy on political survival. In this situation, hanging in there makes you an even bigger loser.

Family Code: There Must Be Over Fifty Thousand Screaming Love And More For You…

It was Simon Zelotes or Simon the Zealot who in the seminal rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar urged Jesus to attack Roman occupiers for he was followed by the fifty thousand who screamed love and more for him. All that was needed was for Jesus to add a touch of hatred for Rome and Galilee would be free once again. It was, in short, an attempt to use religion and its followers to political ends. Fast forward two thousand years and you’ll find similar zealots in Slovenia. It’s just that they’re not fighting Romans but gays. And lesbians. And bisexuals. And anyone else who doesn’t subscribe to the notions of “natural laws”, “normality” and “tradition”, freeing Slovenia not of Latin occupiers but of evil and unnatural ideas, making it a God-given heterosexual haven.

Aleš Primc’s “defenders of all things natural” (source)

As both readers of this blog know, it all has to with the new Family code which the parliament passed last week after what was most likely one of the more brutal legislative procedures in the history of this country. Not necessarily the most brutal, but definitely close. In fact, it was one of those cases where the entire breadth of the ideological and cultural divide in this country became visible. This was not a power struggle nor was it a fight over a slice of the ever thinning financial pie, not even a run on well-paid government jobs. It was, pure and simple, about what kind of a society Slovenes (will) live in. Was? Is, rather. Because even though the Family code was confirmed by the parliament, the ordeal is by no means over. The law, which was significantly watered down on most crucial points in a vane attempt to placate the right wing, miraculously escaped a veto in the National Council but is now subject to yet another referendum bid.

A grass-roots campaign headed by former SLS member Aleš Primc and heavily backed by the Catholic Church was and still is very vocal in their opposition to the new code. As the debate progressed it became more and more obvious that (just as the more observant suspected all along) positions of the political right-wing and Primc’s campaign itself were extremely harmonious and synchronised. In fact, Primc and his lot were only saying what the right wing was thinking. And in the end, they ended up saying it as well.

I’ve no problem with gays in fact I have many gay friends

The level of hypocrisy, double morals and false arguments reached almost unprecedented levels during this debate. No matter how often the myth of “a normal family” was debunked, the opponents of the code kept getting back to that (case in point being France Cukjati MD, of Janez Janša‘s SDS), claiming that by extending the definition of a family beyond its current scope, the traditional family (mother, father, offspring) would somehow lose on importance. That the very fabric of this society will be irreparably torn and that the nation as such will die off sooner rather than later. But woe be unto them who would dare to think that there was anything remotely homophobic in their opposition to the Code because… wait for it… they have a number of gay friends!

This, obviously is the most perfidious of arguments. Justifying one’s homophobia by claiming to have gay friends while bashing them and their rights is derogatory to the extreme. The more the political right tried to prove that their argument was not about denying gays and lesbians equal rights, the more they were proving exactly that. But to be fair, there was a lot of this going around on the political left as well, only in a more subdued manner.

This was quite probably the main reason the code was watered down significantly. Specifically, provision which originally allowed same-sex marriages was reduced to allowing civil unions with full rights while the provision allowing child adoptions by same-sex couples was tightened to allowing adoptions only if one of the partners is a biological parent of the child. Both provisions are a marked improvement over the existing situation but still stop short of completely equalling same-sex and heterosexual couples.

Clash of cultures

Officially, this watering-down was meant to placate Primc, his gang and the political right. But since the only way to placate them was to kill the code entirely, the move was more likely meant to make the code more acceptable to the “traditionalists” on the political left. The fact that the Code was passed by a relative rather than an absolute majority only further strengthens this particular line of thought.

Be that as it may, the new Family Code was passed and – miraculously so – the National Council did not veto it, which means that it should be enacted soon. Well, not really. There’s still the possibility of a referendum. And sure enough Primc and Co. collected 32,000 signatures (only 2500 were needed) to initiate referendum proceedings. In this enterprise they were assisted by the Roman Catholic Church which apparently was more than happy to let them collect signatures in or near churches. But since the Church takes it upon itself to decide questions of morality and properness (never mind the paedophile scandals and the 700 million debt accumulated by a single diocese in Slovenia) this was to be expected. Rather than going apeshit about it, one can only conclude time and again that when push comes to a shove the political and ideological right will resort to any and all weapons in this particular clash of cultures.

What. Happens. Next.

Anyways. President of the parliament Pavle Gantar (who, apparently, will step down sooner rather than later) is now obliged to initiate the procedure in which the proponents of the referendum must collect 40,000 confirmed signatures in a month’s time to call a referendum on the Family Code. Although they collected 32k signatures in a matter of days, the task is slightly more difficult as those 40k signatures must be given on a special form and confirmed by an official at an Administrative Unit (upravna enota) which – if nothing else – means a trek downtown, standing in line and doing the paperwork rather than just signing on the dotted line and being tapped on the back by the local priest. Gantar already said that the procedure will be initiated on 1 September since initiating it now would mean it would end during summer recess.

However, it is probably a safe bet that Primc and Co. will collect enough signatures to have a referendum called. Under this scenario, the government will then petition the Constitutional Court to deny the referendum on the basis that it would mean a popular vote over basic human rights and/or could mean imposing the will of the majority on a clearly defined minority of the population and thus discrimination based on sexual orientation which is explicitly forbidden by the constitution.

Elementary, my dear Watson…

The case seems open-and-shut. There can be no popular vote on human rights. They apply to everyone and are exerted directly, based on the constitution rather than via specific legislation. Elementary? Not really. Sadly, this may not be the case. Technically the Constitutional Court will be asked to deny petitioners their right to a referendum against the right of same-sex couples to have their family-related rights equalled with heterosexual couples. And all of a sudden the case becomes highly complicated.

Luckily, gays, lesbians and everyone else who would benefit from the new Family Code have one thing going for them: a ruling by the Constitutional Court which declared part of the existing law on registration of same-sex couples passed under Janša government unconstitutional and basically said that heterosexual and same-sex civil unions should enjoy equal rights. But before one gets one’s hope too high it should be noted that this case referred only to the right to inheritance. Recently, the Constitutional Court showed cojones and acted pro-actively, effectively making policy, but the question at hand is, whether it will choose to do so again or will feel the need to back up and show restraint.

The final verdict, therefore, is far from conclusive. And Slovenia will thus continue to see bigots waving placards saying how grateful they are to have had a mother and a father at the same time denying some children to have either, saying how marriage is a sacred institution, denying those who want to honour it.

In the aforementioned rock opera, Jesus replied to Simon the Zealot that he doesn’t get it and that is not what Christianity is about. Well, someone should tell Primc and his gang, the political right and everyone who swears to defend the “traditional family” and the “natural order of things that taking the Lord’s name in vain and forgetting the “love thy neighbour” part is making then anything but good Christians.

A Day Late And A Dollar Short

Hollywood is laden with epic “I quit” scenes, with pengovsky’s favourite still being the one in The American Beauty. But the cesspool that is the Slovenian political landscape can occasionally offer a gem or two regarding the style in which someone tells someone else to “take this job and… fill it!”, to put in the words of Abe Simpson

Gregor Golobič and Zares exit the coalition (original image here)

A moment like this occurred yesterday when Zares of Gregor Golobič officially quit the ruling coalition, leaving PM Borut Pahor to his own devices, with LDS leader Katarina Kresal by his side (for the moment, at least). Ever since Zares issued what for all intents and purposes was an ultimatum for a radical cabinet reshuffle, lest the party quits the coalition toute-de-suite, the PM either did not understand the message or thought Golobič was bluffing and did nothing which lead the three remaining minsiters of Zares to quit their posts. Thus Darja Radić, Majda Širca and Irma Pavlinič Krebs followed the example of Gregor Golobič who resigned his ministerial post on the eve of the super-referendum Sunday.

The Letter

To top it off – and probably to make sure that there is no doubt about who if the dumper and who the dumpee in this case – Golobič sent a rather longish letter to Pahor and Kresal, outlining the reasons for Zares taking the plunge. He puts the blame squarely on the PM, accusing him of being unable to rein in special interests and bad practices which this government promised to uproot but failed to do so, thus (says Golobič) affirming and continuing misdeeds of the government of Janez Janša. He specifically cites cases of Patria APCs (Janša in scheduled to stand trial over allegations of bribery and abuse of power over that one) where the government failed to take decisive action. Ditto for the case of Šoštanj coal power plant where the stand-off between Zares and Social Democrats was further complicated by a conflict between local and national interests and which caused a lot of bad blood within Zares as well, provoking open confrontation between Golobič on one side and Matej Lahovnik (former minister of economy) and Cveta Zalokar Oražem (former MP for the party) on the other. Neither Lahovnik nor Zalokar Oražem are party members any longer. And although he doesn’t mention it specifically, the list could be expanded to include the LDS-led fiasco with Draško Veselinovič as the CEO of Nova Ljubljanska Banka, where Katarina Kresal imposed Veselinovič as her man at the helm of Slovenia’s biggest (and state-owned bank) only to see him forced to quit over extending the credit line to Boško Šrot in his failed attempt to take over Laško Brewery (Šrot is standing trial for that one as well).

In other words, the list of grievances is long and distinguished. What is not explicitly mentioned (but is sort of a public secret around here) is the fact that Social Democrats often hijacked Zares’ initiatives, saying that they will gain support in the parliament only if SD is the one who officially introduces them and (by extension) takes the credit. But the real bomb-shell comes in the second part of the letter (Slovene only):

Instead of elementary decisiveness and responsiblity in taking the decisions necessary to ensure the well-being of the country and its citizens and looking for actual not just PR effects, we are increasingly faced with a hyper-production of senseless buzzwords about radars, trains, convoys, ships, throwing in towels and so on, all of which only goes to prove that this particular line of politics has emptied itself and is completely void of ideas.

Golobič then goes on to add

Rejection of our call to reshuffle the cabinet by the PM and leader of the Social Democrats was in our view a short-sighted move, one which opens the door wide open for ascent of the transition right wing with all its properties and effects. We will take no part in this. We do recognise our share of responsibility for the duration of our time in the government. However in the case of scenario which is (knowingly or not) unfolding, we will do no such thing.

In other words, Golobič is saying that Pahor fucked up royally, squandered the chance to make a difference and gave us PR fluff instead, thus rehabilitating the ways of Janez Janša who is already considered the new PM-apparent. Truth be told, Golobič on some other occasions gave credit where credit was due, especially in the case of the Arbitration Agreement and subsequent revolutionary thawing of relations with Croatia, but in terms of internal politics, the letter was about as strong a condemnation as they come.

Pengovsky believes that Golobič might be slightly off as far as ushering in Janša is concerned, but Pahor can take zero credit for that one. The leader of the SDS has crediblity problems of his own, including but not limited to Patria case, fake-grass-roots initiatives to call early election and – curiously enough – strange use of his Twitter account (where pengovsky even played an small and insignificant role).

Barely functioning government

Anyways: as a result, the ruling coalition barely deserves its adjective. The government has only thirty-three votes in a ninety-seat parliament, which makes it practically impossible to govern as the balance of power is now almost completely shifted towards the parliament. There is a gap twelve votes wide and bridging even once would be a political and logistical nightmare. Doing it on a per-vote basis is practically impossible. The government is bleeding as it is and pulling off a stunt like this (and doing it repeatedly) would require inhumane quantities of strength, politicking, horse-dealing and manhandling. It simply can not be done.

Even more so. With four ministers gone, the government is on the verge of being legally defunct. Namely, the Law on government specifies (Article 11) that the government is considered fully empowered if at least two thirds of ministers are appointed (ministers without portfolio notwithstanding). Since there are fifteen full-blooded ministries in this government, Pahor’s government is only two ministers short of being found operationally incapacitated. True, he can temporarily overcome this by assigning a sitting minister to take over another portfolio for a period of no more than six months, but this provision was meant to speed up the formation of the government, not extend the life of a nearly defunct one.

A day late and a dollar short

To put it graphically: when Golobič quit his post of science and higher education minister, PM Pahor entrusted the minister of (primary and secondary) education and sports Igor Lukšič (SD) to take over. He is reportedly poised to take over the ministry of culture as well, while minister of development and European affairs Mitja Gaspari (SD) is rumoured to stand in for Darja Radić in the economy portfolio. By that same token Aleš Zalar (LDS) is rumoured to take over Public Administration ran by Pavlinič Krebs. Given that minister without portfolio tasked with relations with diaspora Boštjan Žekš is already standing in for Henrik Gjerkeš, who was minister without portfolio tasked with local self-government until he quit for driving under the influence, you can see, that this is not even funny any more. Instead it’s bordering on ludicrous. That the government is mulling a reorganisation of the ministries, reducing them in number is just another case of PR spin and alleviating the symptoms rather then administering the cure.

In what is a glimmer of hope, reality seems finally to have caught up with PM Pahor as well, although he came a day late and a dollar short. Word on the street has it that he realised the gravity of the situation just prior to the official celebration of the Statehood Day Friday last and nearly had a melt-down. Whether that is true or not is basically beside the point but it is telling that it was Katarina Kresal who gave the initial reaction to Zares walking out yesterday and that the PM was seen only later in the evening at another official function where he gave a relatively impassioned speech. He is, however, expected to make an announcement regarding the new political reality in the next day or so.

What is this? Afghanistan?!

However, that the leader of the remaining junior coalition party said yesterday was also a relatively ill-conceived attempt at calming an explosive situation. Namely, Katarina Kresal more or less said that what is left of the government will first pick up the pieces, try to pass the remainder of planned legislation and then (this is the important part) work for an orderly transition to early elections, adding that they can’t just drop everything and walk out thus implicitly accusing Zares of doing precisely that. All fine and dandy, it sure as hell ain’t nice being dumped when you’re down and out although – mind you – it is entirely unclear what this will do to Zares’ ratings which leave a lot to be desired as it is.

But the bit about “orderly transition towards early elections” is just plain nonsense (and I’m being kind here, because I kind of like KK). What is this? Iraq? Lybia? Af-fucking-ghanistan?!? Slovenia has no need for “orderly transition” of any kind because save political hard-headedness of the current PM there is nothing that is out of order. Even more so: the constitution clearly provides for exactly these kinds of situation so there is no need to “work towards” anything. The scenario is very simple. If the government falls one way or the other, the sitting ministers and the PM continue in a caretaker role until a new cabinet is appointed. This applies even if the entire cabinet resigns tomorrow. Implying that the world will end if they all just let go is misleading at best. Doubly so since the government is barely functioning as it is.

Calls for early elections are mounting although few of them are genuine. It is a failure by the PM not to be able to tell those which were fake from those which weren’t. The one made by Zares was – well – meant for real.

Early Elections Just Got Canceled

As of yesterday, there’s no doubt what so ever that Slovene Democratic Party of Janez Janša has absolutely no interest to actually call early elections, despite making a lot of hoopla about it.

The Constitution (source)

Amid an atmosphere of growing popular discontent with this nation’s elected representatives, a dog-eat-dog climate and a government which increasingly has to deal with its own problems, calls for early elections are getting ever louder. In fact, the only party which is directly opposing the early elections are (how predictable) Zmago Jelinčič‘s nationalists for whom the elections are always a gamble, although Jelinčič made the cut every time. True, if one were to disregard party affiliation one would quite possibly find that few MPs are keen on cutting their term, but since most of them adhere to party discipline, they seem to be supporting early elections. On surface, at least. Truth be told, next to Jelinčič, the ruling Social Democrats still have to make up their mind, but as long as Borut Pahor stubbornly continues as prime minister, they can more or less successfully dodge the question.

However, even if the SD were to make up their mind and take the plunge, it would amount to very little. You see, under current constitution, early elections are next to impossible. Not completely impossible, but close. To call early elections now, PM Borut Pahor would have to resign, the President would have to nominate a new PM and then a majority of MPs would have to be disciplined enough to vote down this person who would have to be willing to take a dive on an open parliamentary stage. The whole procedure would take a month and a half or so which means that extraordinary discipline of an absolute majority of MPs would have to be maintained for six weeks, not to mention that what was just described is in fact an abuse of democratic procedure.

To circumvent that, ideas were floated to change the constitution and make it easier for the parliament to be dissolved and thus bring about early elections. Pengovsky already wrote about President Danilo Türk threading on thin ice on this issue. There’s also Zares of Gregor Golobič, which floated ideas about amending this part of the constitution as early as January this year and expanded on them later on. Not that theirs is a perfect solution. If pengovsky understood correctly, Zares wants the president – upon resignation of a sitting MP – to be able to either appoint a new candidate for MP or dissolve the parliament and call early elections. This idea has one major problem: if the PM and his government atr elected by the parliament (which is the case now), they can only tender their resignations to the parliament. If Zares really wanted to bring the President into the picture, they would have to revamp the entire system of separation of powers. Which is probably a good idea, but would probably require much more careful consideration. Taking powers on one end and putting them on another end of the systems checks-and-balances can have unpredictably massive effects.

But if Zares’ proposal is something to consider and work on because it may yield beneficial results, the proposal which the SDS of Janez Janša submitted to the parliament ~~today~~ on Monday is a piece of bullshit deluxe. What SDS did was propose an amendment to Article 81 of the Constitution, basically saying that an absolute majority of MPs (46, to be exact) can vote to dissolve the parliament and thus hold elections within two-months-time.

What sounds lovely at first glance, is in reality a huge piece of political crap. If a majority of MPs were able to dissolve the parliament, they’d be doing it all the time, Every time the government would consider that its ratings allow, it would be able to call early elections with little or no warning whatsoever, get re-elected and win another four year term, long before the first one would end. It would also equip the ruling party with an unfair advantage as it would be able to control the election schedule rather than the situation which we have now, when everything is more or less clear in advance. Furthermore, empowering 46 MPs with a power do dissolve the institution which represents the sovereign of this country (the people), goes against every political and legal theory. If election laws need 2/3 majority to be confirmed and if the ~~government~~ constitution needs a double 2/3 majority to be changed, it is simply not logical for such a strong and far reaching instrument to be invoked by only an absolute majority.

SDS of course know all of the above. They did the math and they know that they have neither legal grounds nor political support to pull off a stunt like that. However, being masters of procedure that they are, they’ve effectively hijacked the procedure for changing the constitution and have in effect blocked any attempts to indeed change it. Namely: their motion takes precedence and it means that the procedure constitutional will have to go full circle, probably all the way from debate in the constitutional committee to the plenum vote. Given that we are just about to enter the summer break, the SDS have thus ensured that this procedure will last well into the autumn, possibly winter. By then regular elections would be practically around the corner, Zares’ motion (even if it entered the parliamentary procedure) doesn’t stand a chance of even being debated on, much less surviving a vote.

Thus the largest opposition party made sure that nothing will change and that early elections will definitely not be held. Which is precisely what they wanted. Despite the fact that prominent SDS members are running rather naive sounding on-line petitions, early elections are bad for the party, since it has no election platform and seems to be convinced that the more beating PM Pahor receives, the easier SDS and Janez Janša will reach their goal of 50+ (percent of votes in the new parliament).

The proposed amendments to the constitution by the SDS are therefore nothing but a stalling manoeuvre aimed at prolonging the life of this parliament for as long as politically possible.

Lame Duck Government

The government of Borut Pahor is as good as dead. After having their respective pow-wows, the remaining junior coalition parties, Zares of Gregor Golobič and LDS of Katarina Kresal demanded that either a comprehensive cabinet re-shuffle takes place (Zares) or a new government formed under the existing coalition (LDS). In both cases this includes the change at the top spot, effectively meaning that both parties want PM Pahor to step down.

Prime Minister Pahor during today’s press conference (source)

Of the two, the call by Zares is more radical as they want to see a result within fourteen days lest they quit the coalition. LDS on the other hand made a more hard-line call but they didn’t provide a time-frame, meaning that theirs was more a show of force rather than an actual commitment. On the other hand, Zares presented Pahor with an offer he can’t really afford to accept. Namely, if Pahor accepts Golobič’s offer and returns his mandate, he admits he has little or no control over the situation. On the other hand, if he doesn’t take the deal, Zares walks out of the coalition and Pahor’s coalition is down to 34 votes.

However, the PM decided to play hard-ball and challenged Zares to make good on its threats. As hinted yesterday by Igor Lukšič, minister of education and senior SD member, Pahor flat-out rejected Golobič and basically told him to go stick his head in a bucket (not in as many words, of course). Even more, the PM said that should he lose a confidence vote, his party will not put forward another candidate for the top spot but will rather work towards calling early elections. Translation: Pahor will blame Zares if the government falls.

However, behind the thick veil of bluff Pahor served today, he is only buying time and still considering his next move. He is not clear on whether the government will propose an emergency law or a rebalanced budget in order to save the 300 million needed and whether he will tie a confidence vote to either of the acts. He also entertained journalists’ questions on whether he will consider a thinly veiled offer Janez Janša made yesterday to form a grand SD-SDS coalition, but then found a plethora of reasons (all of them valid) why that would be an extremely bad idea. In other words, he can not decide on just how high a wager he is prepared to place in this particular game of political poker.

So, how will this play out? Despite Pahor’s insistence that he expects Zares to “extend the deadline”, the party of Gregor Golobič will most likely quit the coalition in two weeks. That this will happen on Statehood Day (June 25) is likely a coincidence, but a very symbolic one: 20th anniversary of Slovenian independence will be celebrated amid political turmoil. How very fitting 🙂

But little will change after that date. Zares, not being a part of the coalition , will have the luxury of picking which projects it will support, but one can hardly expect the party to go over to the opposition side. So, what we will have, will be a lame duck government, surviving on a daily basis unless of course Prime Minister Pahor finally makes up his mind and either seeks a new coalition (unlikely) or steps down and allows for early elections. Odd are that the current shaky coalition would find them more beneficial than the opposition which remains ill prepared platform-wise.