Mladina: 2012 protest momentum has been lost
STA, 5 October 2018 - Labelling the latest developments in the country the Epilogue to 2012 Protests, the left-leaning weekly Mladina comments on Friday that the momentum of the protests that took down the Janez Janša government has worn out six years later.
The epilogue to the protests that arose from Slovenians having enough of corruption, cheating politicians, quasi capitalism and fake free market is not good, Mladina editor-in-chief Grega Repovž writes.
According to him, the protests resulted in the justice system gaining courage to prosecute powerful people who violated the law.
"And where are we today? To a great extent, we are where we were in 2012. The supreme and constitutional courts have annulled all the provisions and rulings that hurt these politicians in the name of protecting human rights ... A look back is like a bad film about autocrats, for whom judges clear everything and clean their records. A really bad film."
A closer look shows that mostly those who have no political power to shield them have been found guilty. "If a person is committed to the rule of law and wants to respect the legal order - must they simply forget everything they know about [politicians'] shenanigans? Amnesty for them and amnesia for us," Repovž wonders.
Why would people still believe in courts, which have showed them that you can win if you are willing to act completely inconsiderately?
"What was the reason behind the 2012 protests? Who won? The public did not," the paper concludes.
Reporter: The role the Left in the government remains a concern
STA, 1 October 2018 - The weekly Reporter keeps taking issue with the role of the Left as the external partner of the coalition of five parties centred around the Marjan Šarec List (LMŠ), saying that Left head Luka Mesec wants to be the one who is giving the green light for almost everything, including staffing in the prime minister's office.
"Mesec is currently the biggest star on the Slovenian political sky", editor-in-chief Silvester Šurla says in Full Moon, adding that Mesec had completely overshadowed the new Prime Minister Marjan Šarec.
"Mesec is everywhere, like a full Moon of bloody red colour, he is showing us the way towards a better future. His is not only the coordinator of the Left, he wants to win such status at the government level, too."
Since the new government took over, everything revolves around the Left, an "extremist party which tipped the scales in the election of Šarec for prime minister-designate", the commentary says, adding that without it there would be no "minority" government.
In the 5 + 1 government coalition, the Left has a special status, and it has also left the biggest mark on the coalition agreement. It does not really matter whether the initialled agreement on the cooperation with the Left will be eventually signed.
Given the current balance of powers in parliament, the Left cannot overthrow Šarec, unless it connects with the centre-right parties, which is impossible from today's perspective. But a possible collapse of the government is not in the interest of the influential networks which rule the (para)state sector either.
The more or less staged conflicts between the Left and the coalition will continue to serve as a smokescreen for all the messy things that will keep happening, for example in the SSH custodian of state assets and in the state-owned bad bank BAMC.
The police and prosecution will meanwhile continue to look away and will deal with witch hunting, for example prosecuting hate speech, concludes the commentary.
