Slovenian “Demokracija” magazine warns about the pro-Russian links of the new ruling party – the Freedom Movement by Robert Golob which swept to power in the recent elections.

The freedom movement (N/A) got 41 seats in a 90-seats parliament. SDS/EPP got 27, N.Si/EPP 8, SD/PES 7, Levica/PEL 5, and 2 MPs of the HU and IT minorities. Outgoing Prime Minister Janez Jansa from the SDS party campaigned hard on his free market policies, but especially on his strong stance on Ukraine. He Still, a deeply intertwined network of “old boys” politicians, businessmen and media moguls, around former President Milan Kucan, were able to grab power using their fourth purpose made new political party in a row, “Demokracija” reports.

According to the Eurobarometer, Slovenia is one of the most pro – Russian country in the EU. Government (and especially PM) has been regularly criticized by media and opposition parties because of its firm support for Ukraine. During election campaign, Mr. Robert Golob and his people already forecasted that Slovenia would “normalize” relations with Russia. Mr. Golob justified the Russian occupation of Crimea by saying that the Russians followed the logic of protecting the territory where Russians live. Mrs.Marta Kos (Former secretary-general of the Forum21 movement, established by the last president of the Communist Party of Slovenia Milan Kučan. She is a proclaimed candidate for the President of the Republic of Slovenia at the elections in Novmber 2022), the VP of the Freedom movement, doesn’t hide her support for Putin either. She opposed helping Ukraine with defensive weapons and attacked PM Janša because he visited Kyiv and not Moscow. “In the future, we will have to talk to Russia, as there will be no European security or a new security structure without Russia,” said the Vice-President of the Freedom Movement. The Ljubljana Mayor Zoran Janković, one of the most prominent supporters of Robert Golob (Mr. Golob was his vice president when Janković formed a similar type of party list for the 2011 general elections), refuses to return the medals he proudly received from Vladimir Putin. On January 13th, the prosecutor general of the Republic of Slovenia, Mr. Drago Šketa, appointed by the previous government, traveled to Russia and signed a cooperation agreement with the head of the Russian prosecutors, Igor Krasnov – who was blacklisted by the EU back in March 2021. The agreement was signed – without the knowledge of the Government of Slovenia – on the sidelines of a celebration dedicated to the 300th anniversary of the Russian Prosecutor’s Office, the conservative magazine reports.

“Demokracija” warns that we can now expect to see the next Government of Slovenia to begin making concessions to Russian businessmen, such as those from the Yandex company. “The creators of Robert Golob’s newly formed party are trying to position it on the EU political map as liberal. The fact of the matter is that the Freedom movement’s ideology has nothing to do with liberalism. Its corpus is predominantly “Old boys network”, strengthened by the second and third generations, and it owes its success to left-wing media monopolies and far-left NGOs. Golob also took a large majority of the anti-wax and covid-denial vote – which proved to be decisive for his victory – claiming that Covid-19 is nothing more than an ordinary flue and that it should have never stopped public life. His party doesn’t have a single local branch or any other structure typical for a political party. The formal leadership is populated by anti-market demagogues from trade unions, journalists, influencers, former judges, former collaborators of secret political police, state-financed NGOs, and the public sector employees. One of Golob’s priorities will be the payback package for their supporters”, “Demokracija notes”.