The war in Ukraine divided the Slovaks during the campaign. The two favorite candidates, Peter Pellegrini, current President of Parliament, and Ivan Korcok, experienced diplomat, are diametrically opposed on the subject. The first being pro-Russian, and the second advocating a pro-European policy of support for kyiv.
Slovaks began voting this Saturday March 23 in the first round of the presidential election. According to polls, Peter Pellegrini is credited with 37% of voting intentions compared to 36% for Ivan Korcok. Mr. Pellegrini, former head of government, has the support of the current populist Prime Minister, Robert Fico, who refuses to provide any military aid to Ukraine, has questioned the sovereignty of this country and called for peace with Russia. “The Slovak political scene is divided between those who are in favor of continuing the war (between Russia and Ukraine) at all costs, and those who demand the opening of peace negotiations,” he said. “I belong to the latter category,” he recently told AFP.
Mr. Korcok, former Minister of Foreign Affairs, for his part defends the Ukrainian cause. He has opinions similar to those of outgoing president Zuzana Caputova, who is very critical of the government and who has decided not to run for a second term. Among the other candidates in the running, Eurosceptic Stefan Harabin, 66, who has openly praised Russian President Vladimir Putin, comes third in the polls. “I would do exactly the same thing as Putin regarding the events in Ukraine,” he wrote on social networks the day after the Russian aggression.
Strengthen the posture of the pro-Russian Prime Minister
In this small central European republic, member of the European Union, the euro zone and NATO, the president has very limited powers unlike the Prime Minister. Its functions are essentially protocolary. He nevertheless ratifies international treaties, appoints the main judges and is the commander-in-chief of the armed forces.
Many analysts point out, however, that a head of state approving the policies of Robert Fico, the current head of government, could strengthen his position. “If the powers of the Slovak president are limited, this vote of the voters serves as a thermometer, to see if the population supports the nationalist and pro-Russian turn of the new government”, analyzes Jana Vargovčikovà for RFI. “It’s a form of referendum,” she added.
The Slovak press says nothing else. “Will Fico be (elected) president?” asked herself in an editorial, the editor-in-chief of Sme. A way of insinuating that candidate Pellegrini is above all an ersatz Prime Minister. In its March 21 edition, the Bratislava weekly Tyzden also believes that “between a free country and a satellite of Russia, a key decision on Slovakia will be taken [lors de cette élection]”. For its editor-in-chief, voting for Pellegrini would amount to legitimizing the policy of Prime Minister Roberto Fico and, through it, that of the Kremlin: “We betray our allies and qualify the Ukrainians, who shed their blood for our freedom, as a people corrupt.”
Aside from the presidential election, the war in Ukraine has divided Slovakia for some time. Very soon after the Russian invasion began in February 2022, Slovakia provided its eastern neighbor with substantial military and humanitarian aid. But this initiative was quickly undermined when populist Prime Minister Robert Fico took power in October 2023 and refused to continue military aid to kyiv, whose sovereignty he calls into question.
Slovak voters, many of whom welcomed Ukrainian refugees into their homes at the start of the invasion, have also begun to turn their backs on kyiv. More than half of them said in a poll that they were convinced that the West or Ukraine were responsible for the war. Voting in Slovakia ends at 10 p.m. this Saturday and a second round is scheduled for April 6, if no candidate obtains more than 50% of the votes.