This weekend, two new political parties were announced in Slovakia. The mayor of the western Slovak city of Trenčín, Richard Rybníček, has introduced his new formation called TOSKA. The letters of the name stand for the Slovak equivalents of the words "tradition", "expertise", "service", "communicativeness" and "ambition". The new party's program includes the decentralisation of Slovakia and a return to having traditional regions. These steps would, in practice, lead to increasing the current number of regions (eight) in Slovakia and a shift of competences from the central government to each region. Another party called the Independence and Unity, or NAJ, was announced by Viktor Béreš, currently a member of the party's Preparatory Committee. This formation aims to introduce the rule of law, equality of rights for everyone, justice and law enforcement. Thus, there are as many as 153 registered political parties in Slovakia at the moment, with only 63 of them being active.
Slovakia has a long history of creating new political parties. Many of them end their activity quickly after unsuccessful runs for parliament. In the past, several "new parties" helped to create a government and would subsequently turn out to last only for one term. The list includes Union of the Slovak Workers in the 1990s and Party of Civil Understanding and Alliance of the New Citizen in the early 2000s. The most current example is the Sieť (Network) party, which helped to form the government this March, however, lost most of its MPs after a few months, and at present, polls indicate a significant drop in its popularity. On the contrary the new parties which survived even after a term in the government are the parties Freedom and Solidarity and Most-Híd. Currently, they both hold seats in Parliament.
Moreover, in recent years, not only Slovakia but also greater Europe is experiencing a rise of new parties labelling themselves as 'anti-establishment'. "They don't let themselves be restricted by programs or ideology, their only topic is a change of the old corrupt political structures," a sociologist Jozef Majchrák wrote for the conservative website Postoj.sk. The parliamentary Ordinary People or We are family parties represent this trend in Slovakia. As Majchrák added "a look to the past indicates that only those anti-establishment movements survived for longer, which managed to turn the pure protest into something more; adding a program, ideology and structure," he explained.
