Today, on the first attempt, the deputies failed to open the discussion of the last session of the parliament this year. In addition to the opposition and the deputies around the rebel Rudolf Huliak, even Smer legislator Ľubomír Vážny did not present himself.
Photo: SITA, Milan Illík
Member of Parliament Rudolf Huliak and vice-chairman of the NR SR for SNS Andrej Danko.
Deputy Vážny told journalists that he made a mistake during the vote and pressed the button late. Subsequently, he did not forgive his remark about the hooligans, who, according to the former Minister of Transport, “should receive three ministries when there are three”.
The coalition is in a new situation as of today. After the departure of three deputies around Huliak, they can fully rely only on a narrow majority – 76 deputies. The Speaker of the Parliament, Peter Žiga, will therefore present a procedural proposal at the beginning of the meeting, which will change the course of the Parliament. Discussions will also take place on Mondays, and voting will probably take place on specific days. There is still no agreement on the members of the STVR Council or on the chairman of the NR SR. What will the meeting look like?
Approval of the state budget is also on the agenda. On Tuesday, there is also an extraordinary meeting on the agenda, at which the Minister of the Interior Matúš Šutaj Eštok (Hlas) will face the impeachment.
The coalition is learning to live with 76
Non-affiliated member of parliament and chairman of the National Coalition, Rudolf Huliak, did not want to comment on how he would behave before the meeting. Yesterday, the coalition leaders told him that if he wants them to start negotiations with him, he must return to the SNS club. The hooligans refused. However, shortly before 12, he expressed himself on Telegram and wrote that “until the agreements that were given to us are fulfilled, we will not participate in the opening of the next session of the parliament.”
“We will vote according to our conscience and consciousness, which is enshrined in principle in the Constitution of the Slovak Republic,” the deputy wrote. “Once we agreed not to open the meeting, so we won’t. And we don’t have the slightest reason to return to the SNS club, among people who don’t know how to greet you,” Huliak said later. In the CIS, they also consider the return of hooligans to the club to be relatively “unrealistic”. At the beginning of the meeting, all deputies will be present “up to the mark”. The meeting will open and they have agreed on a common procedure for recalling Šutaj Eštok. However, the rules of negotiation will be temporarily changed for the time being.
Meetings will also be held on Mondays, meeting days will be extended until 20:00 and the lunch break will last only one hour. There will be no voting on Monday and Friday. The procedural proposal will be submitted at the beginning of the meeting by the Acting Speaker of the Parliament, Peter Žiga (Voice). “The negotiation method will be adjusted to ensure 76. The authorized chairman will make procedural proposals, which I assume will pass, and we will test how the coalition will function in the narrowest possible majority,” said SNS club member Roman Michelko.
According to Michelek, the key laws related to the recovery plan and the state budget will be passed. “The others are nothing fundamental. Even if something doesn’t happen by chance, no disaster will happen. There will certainly be 76 deputies at those fundamental negotiations,” he said. How long can it work like this? The coalition has three more years of governance ahead of it, according to Michelek, everything will be seen after this meeting. “The second thing is that a change can be made in the agenda, as it is in some parliaments, that only one or two days a week are reserved for voting,” he said.
Thus, voting would not take place twice a day, but voting would be more concentrated and exact days and times would be defined. “However, there must also be self-reflection among the hooligans and, of course, the coalition will have to want to have some kind of agreement so that we do not operate in crisis mode. Now it’s actually about the fact that Huliak first made a warning strike. He showed what his weight is when MP Blcháč was out,” Michelko thinks. According to him, now he wants to show it too. “The coalition wants to show that it is very difficult, but it can be done without him. The question is how long they will sulk. It would be rational to have some type of agreement,” added Michelko regarding the coalition situation.
Huliak was not allowed on the committee, the vote of confidence will not be combined
The rules were agreed upon at the parliamentary committee before the meeting. However, Rudolf Huliak was not allowed to attend the meeting of the parliamentary committee. “He was there until now as a representative of SNS, since he left the club, it is logical,” commented Michelko from SNS. On the sidelines of the coalition statement, Huliak also stated that demanding compliance with agreements is not blackmail.
In the coalition, there is still no agreement on the head of the parliament, which Šutaj Eštok wants to have by the end of the year, nor on the members of the STVR Council, which is related to the election of the president of the National People’s Congress of the Slovak Republic. Daniel Krajcer and Igor Gallo are rejected by SNS, for party chairman Andrej Danek, these names are unacceptable. In the CIS, they consider it “very unfortunate”. This point is included in the meeting among the last, and according to Michelek, it will not be discussed at this meeting, but he does not rule out an agreement.
As part of the fragility of the coalition, Prime Minister and head of Smer Robert Fico (Smer) also spoke about the fact that the vote on the state budget could be combined with the vote on expressing confidence in the government. For now, however, they are not considering it in the coalition. “It would be in play if any other deputies announced a problem with the budget. It is the only forceful tool of coercion to pass the key points. I think it will not be necessary to do it,” Michelko responded.
However, Huliak considers the budget to be anti-social. “Therefore, we will make comments and proposals for changes to it, in the form of parliamentary proposals,” he wrote on Telegram. The state budget will come up on Thursday. “We will try to overlook the coalition council’s threats to constitutional officials about the criminal law impacts on our free vote, because this should rather be a subject for investigation by the OCTK,” he added.
Source: spravy.pravda.sk
