Protesters on SNP Square Again Call for Kalinak to Resign

Bratislava, June 27 (TASR) – Around 2,000 people gathered at SNP Square in Bratislava on Monday to call on Interior Minister Robert Kalinak to resign for allegedly covering up tax frauds involving businessman Ladislav Basternak.

The protest was organised by the two strongest Opposition parties Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) and OLaNO-NOVA. This was the second demonstration of what OLaNO-NOVA chief Igor Matovic last week announced would be a series of weekly protests set to take place for the next six months – if Kalinak stays in office. The first protest last week was staged in front of Premier Robert Fico’s private flat in the Bonaparte residential complex – also belonging to Basternak, who has not been heard from for several weeks.

Politicians appearing on the platform on SNP Square described corruption as the most troubling problem of Slovakia today. “It reaches the top echelons,” said SaS chairman Richard Sulik.

The demonstrators several times called on Kalinak to resign and be put in jail, and also expressed their displeasure with Fico. After around an hour on SNP Square, the crowd moved towards the Bonaparte complex.

A parliamentary no-confidence motion in Kalinak is scheduled for Thursday. He survived one on the same matter earlier this month, but the Opposition has garnered sufficient new material for another petition to oblige Parliamentary Chairman Andrej Danko to call the House back for this vote.