Presidential elections in Slovakia

Back to News

30.03.2019 - First female president in Slovakia. The lady who set the expectations very high - Zuzana Caputova. Political newcomer beated the current Eurocommissaris Maros Sefcovic.

This lady had in November last year references on a level of 5%. In the end more than 1 300 000 votes moved her in the palace supported with a campaign worth more than 1 mil. Euro.

There were 15 candidates this year. Highest number in the short history of presidential elections in Slovakia. The current president Andrej Kiska did not run because of own political ambitions to create a political party and/orsuspicions about financing his campaign 5 years ago. Immediately after the new president has been elected Mr. Kiska announced his ambition to create a new political movement after end of his presidency in couple of weeks.

Half a year ago there was from the opposition spectreonlyone relevant candidate for the office - Mr. Rober Mistrik. Former scientist, entrepreneur and active citizen preparing his way to the presidency in a very sophisticated way. According the polls last year only he was able to compete with a potential candidate of the strongest political party candidate who was in that time still not known. A constant support was seen for Mr. Kotleba, the leader of the parliamentary political party LSNS(ultra nationalist) and Mr. Harabin(anti-EU) a very popular judge in Slovakia,former Minister of justice and a person who won lot of legal cases against the state.

Less then 2 months before the elections, SMER-SD the biggest political force in Slovakia in the last decade nominated a candidate..Eurocommissaris Maros Sefcovic. Not known in Slovakia but a huge name in Europe and in the international circles. Results of polls changed from one week to another creating 2 clear leaders in the persons of Zuzana Caputova and Maros Sefcovic. Both of them strongly dedicated to the EU.

The first round ended with a victory of Zuzana Caputova 40,57% against 18.66% of Maros Sefcovic. Other candidates had less then 15%. In the eyes of Europe, this was a huge victory against nationalism, populism andprotectionismpropagated by Mr. Harabin and Kotleba. On the other hand it must be said that if these two candidates would come to an agreement.. they would have together more than 24% and Slovakia would have a very nervous second round.

Lot of work to do for Maros Sefcovic in the second round and the question if it's even possible to close this big gap in votes. No it was not possible. The machinery of Ms Caputova could not be stopped.. biggest campaign in the history of this small country, support of famous actors, support of the media and the motto "Everyone against Fico" as it was pretracted in the media that Mr. Sefcovic is "the guy" of the demonized leader of the Social democrats.. this was too big for Mr. Sefcovic who doesn't have the necessary experience on the national level + a very short campaign against 10 months of Ms Caputova.

Ms Caputova won with 58.4%, more than 1.000.000 votes against more than 750.000 votes for Mr. Sefcovic.

Speaking about all together against the evil and fairness for everyone were the 2 main drivers of Ms Caputova. On the other hand Mr. Sefcovic tried to turn the campaign into religion and values against liberal approach of the other candidate. But not enough time and fear to disconnect himself from the chairman of the social democrats contributed to the fact he could not succeed in this battle.

As mentioned in the beginning, Zuzana Caputova has given lot of hope and she must be succesful in order to slow down the growth of far right national parties as we see it in the western part of Europe. She state that she lacks experience in foreign politics neverthless this is the main function of the president, she will count on her team to support and guide her. Let's hope she will have a lucky hand.

Article supplied by advies s.r.o your source in Slovakia and Czech republic