President Urges Coalition to Resolve Parliamentary Chair Issue

Bratislava, August 26 (TASR) - President Peter Pellegrini on Monday urged the governing coalition to definitively resolve the problem of electing a new parliamentary chair.
        Following his meeting with Peter Ziga (Voice-SD), who is in charge of managing Parliament on a temporary basis, the president stated that the functioning of the House hasn't been paralysed despite this situation.
        Pellegrini called on MPs to adopt laws that will address people's real problems. He said that he'll appear before Parliament with a state of the republic report by the end of the year.
        "The time is coming when the problem with appointing and electing the new parliamentary chair must be definitively decided. If there is political tension, we simply need to seek a solution to this problem and not postpone it indefinitely, as this is not conducive to stability, and I think that the governing coalition must be able to find a way to resolve this situation," stated the president.
        Pellegrini stressed that he respects the outcome of the general election and that he will neither interfere in the process, nor indicate what the result should look like. According to him, Parliament is fully functional even now, "but in order to send a signal of stability and of the coalition's ability to find consensus, it would be good to resolve this personnel issue as well," he added.
        The president is scheduled to meet Premier Robert Fico (Smer-SD) on Tuesday (August 27). "Subsequently, I will continue to meet the chairmen of the coalition parliamentary parties, then the chairmen of the opposition parliamentary parties and, of course, respective ministers if I deem it necessary with regard to the current situation," he said. He also wants to resume the tradition of regular meetings of the top three constitutional officials on fundamental issues of domestic and foreign policy.