The Slovak opposition is preparing a 'Maidan' coup and will attempt to initiate early elections in collaboration with foreign actors, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico (Smer-SD) averred at a joint press briefing with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban in Bratislava on Tuesday.
Fico based this claim on a report by the Slovak Intelligence Service (SIS), submitted to a special emergency House session originally convened by the opposition to hold a no-confidence motion in the government on Tuesday.
"I can't disclose the content of the report, but I can say in all seriousness that the opposition is preparing a 'Maidan', it's gearing up to thwart the government from exercising its powers and this it will do in cooperation with foreign actors," said Fico, adding that the opposition has failed to notice that the "global state of affairs has changed significantly" in the meantime.
Fico believes that the opposition will attempt to push Slovakia towards early elections. "Based on some type of event, for instance, if security forces took action against protest activities violating the law," he warned.
Slovak President Peter Pellegrini, former leader of the now coalition party Hlas-SD.
President Peter Pellegrini will visit the headquarters of the Slovak Intelligence Service (SIS) on Wednesday (January 22) in order to get acquainted with all the relevant information in connection with the report that was the subject of the debate in Parliament on Tuesday.
"President Peter Pellegrini received the SIS report, which was the subject of today's parliamentary meeting. On the basis of this information, he asked the SIS director to familiarise himself with all the relevant information," said the President's Office. The meeting will take place in the morning, with other state forces in attendance.
With respect to the secret service report, Opposition PS leader Michal Simecka is concerned that the Prime Minister suffers from delusions and sees things that don't really exist.
Simecka is alarmed that, in collaboration with the Slovak Intelligence Service (SIS), the Prime Minister is disseminating his paranoid conspiracy theories, but even that cannot divert attention away from the fact that the coalition is crumbling apart and the incumbent government must be brought to an end.
Simecka pointed out that protest gatherings, organised by civic society, are much more peaceful than those organised in the past against previous governments by the current coalition, when Fico as an opposition leader was "stirring up the people". Simecka underlined that the right to assembly belongs among the fundamental constitutionally guaranteed rights and voiced concern over the fact that Fico uses the term "Maidan-isation" in reference to them, seeing as "Maidan" means 100 civilian fatalities, shot dead by members of security forces. In PS’s view, Fico should weigh his words more carefully.
According to opposition SaS the report is absurd and they believe it didn't contain anything to warrant having a closed-door House session with the public barred from observing.
"What served as a pretext to exclude public from the session was typical claptrap of Robert Fico that you can regularly experience in his videos, the weaving of some conspiracy theories of who's connected to whom and what kind of protests are being hatched against the Government. Save for a single exception, all these information are publicly available," stated MP Ondrej Dostal (SaS).
According to opposition party KDH the report cited by Fico can easily be found on the web or social networks. "I condemn with the whole of KDH such actions that information that an ordinary person could find on Google or a social network has been classified and we can't discuss and speak publicly," stressed party chair Milan Majersky.
MP Frantisek Miklosko (KDH) pointed out that the content of the report and its style reminded him of the accusations during the communist era. The report allegedly speaks of warnings about the destabilisation of the country.
Miklosko didn't like the style and content of the classified report because it reminded him of the style of the erstwhile communist-era secret service the StB and the communists during the fight against believers, when they were suspected of being in league with the imperialist West and the "reactionary" Vatican. "We aren't preparing a 'Maidan' [Uprising], but I have serious concerns that this government is preparing a 'Maidan'," he said, adding that there could be provocation at the protests, which would then be used by the coalition.
Source: TASR
