Kiska Commissions Fico with Forming Government by March 18

Bratislava, March 9 (TASR) – Prime Minister Robert Fico (Smer-SD) was commissioned by President Andrej Kiska on Wednesday with attempting to form a new government following Saturday’s general election, in which Smer came first on 28.28 percent of the votes.

Kiska gave Fico a deadline of March 18 to set up a new government. At the same time Fico announced that he’ll launch talks on creating a governing coalition as early as on the same day.

According to Fico, neither the setting up of a caretaker government, nor a snap election would be appropriate solutions for Slovakia at the moment. “This would only deepen the chaos,” he said.

The Smer chief plans to draw up a list of parties that he believes are worth speaking to. “I’ll approach them, and if they don’t even express interest in meeting me, I’ll respect that,” said Fico. “There aren’t many alternatives,” he added.

“SDKU-DS and KDH have been virtually deleted from the political world”, and the standard political system has suffered a significant shock, said Fico. Meanwhile, elements that don’t belong to a standard parliamentary system have been strengthened.

“These elements are based on the principles of business companies. They are parties without membership bases, created without any programme within a few weeks,” said Fico.

Slovakia is now facing the question of whether the chaos and internal political crisis will deepen, or whether the standard political parties will attempt to halt this process in order to ensure at least a dignified representation for Slovakia during its Presidency of the EU Council in the second half of this year, added the prime minister.