Slovenia’s largest party, the Slovenian Democratic Party (Slovenska demokratska stranka – SDS), has recently organised its 30th traditional meeting of committees from all over Slovenia. More than 100 buses and hundreds of cars came to Bovec to attend the meeting.
We asked the participants why they come to these meetings. “We came to support the event in Bovec, which is the biggest political activity organised by the SDS party. There are a lot of young people here, and we also have our own stand. I hope even more young people will come next year,” said one of the participants.
Another said: “I am here because there’s good company to be found, the best party, the biggest political event in Slovenia. We are happy that young people can be part of it, because there are a lot of us here this year.” “We are here because we support the party and we love our country”; “I have been coming here for the last 20 years. Because I can still walk, I still come here. This is our holiday, patriotism.”
We also asked random participants whether they had any message for the government. They replied as follows: “It is high time for them to wake up.”; “It is too late now for the government to improve, because it will be changed in March.”; The government is good. Let the government stay just like it is and bury itself completely.”; “The government should leave as soon as possible. Every minute they are in power is a minute too long.”; “They should stop joking around.”; “They should resign, they should just leave.” The sympathisers are convinced that the SDS party will win the next elections.
Record attendance
The gathering of members and sympathisers of the Slovenian Democratic Party took place on a sunny and hot day. The organisers were even a little taken aback by the number of visitors, with well over 5,000 present. In comparison, the festival of the ruling Freedom Movement party (Gibanje Svoboda) had just over 500 attendees. The annual games were also held alongside a pleasant social gathering. There was a tug-of-war, where strength was measured, and a dry skiing competition, where coordination and agility were measured. There was also the annual football tournament.
Encouraging numbers of new members
The official part of the event started with a greeting from the Mayor of the Municipality of Bovec, who was not expecting such a crowd. “Every year, there are more of you. We are happy and proud to see that you like coming back to our town. I believe that this will continue to be the case in the future,” said Mayor Valter Mlekuž. President of the SDS party, Janez Janša, also addressed the gathering and said that this has been a good year for the party. The number of new members is particularly encouraging. “Over two thousand new members have joined the SDS party in this period. In short, we have had more new members in the last year than most or practically all other Slovenian parties, except two.”
“There are three parties in the government coalition, and they agreed among themselves – one will be in favour of increasing state spending on defence, two will be against. Then they competed to see who would submit a referendum, who would cancel it and who would propose an additional one. When we spoiled their game a bit, they said: ‘The opposition is to blame’,” Janša said, referring to recent developments and also recalling that seventeen years ago, the leftists deliberately destroyed the most successful government in Slovenia’s history. Since then, we have still not managed to pick ourselves up, and we have not yet reached our full potential.
“In 2008, Slovenia was far ahead of practically all the other new Member States, with which we had joined the European Union four years earlier, on all criteria. Everyone was looking up at us in terms of GDP, prosperity, GDP per capita, and economic growth. It seemed that with just a few more years to go, Slovenia would be above the European average,” Janša said. But this did not happen. Instead, we then entered two decades of new faces.
Slovenia then increasingly got worse year by year. It is no different with the current government, which has passed many laws, held more than a hundred extraordinary sessions of the National Assembly, but has not adopted a single development law at these sessions. “In the last three years on the bench of the National Assembly, we have not received a single law that would in any way improve the competitiveness of the Slovenian economy, increase your wages and pensions or the basis for higher wages and pensions, or in any way eliminate the development disparities between the regions of Slovenia. All we got in terms of welfare and the economy were proposals for higher taxes and levies,” the SDS President pointed out.
Janša confirms that the SDS party will form a coalition with the voters
Janša predicted his victory in the upcoming elections and once again confirmed that the Slovenian Democratic Party will form a coalition with the voters. They will not calculate with whom they could form a government. They will win on their own, with the help of the voters who will recognise the urgent need for true reforms. “Don’t bother with those who say it can’t be done. Don’t bother with those who say: ‘There are too few of you,’ or: ‘Who will you form a coalition with?’ We will form a coalition with the voters. We are not excluding anyone,” Janša said.
In addition to the stands of the local party committees, people were also attracted by the travelling bookstore of the Nova obzorja (New Horizons) publishing house, Buk@varna (Bookshop). Throughout the day, people were eager to buy books, mingle with the famous faces of our television station and have a drink. The SDS party’s annual summer camp will run until the 2nd of August, and on the 25th and the 26th of July, the traditional climb to Triglav will take place.
Ž. N.
