At the October Regular Session of the National Assembly, MPs addressed a number of questions to Prime Minister Robert Golob, and Slovenian Democratic Party (Slovenska demokratska stranka – SDS) MP Franc Breznik confronted him with the facts, accusing him and his government of generously funding NGOs which, according to the letter signed by more than 40 NGOs, support the Iranian regime and terrorism, and he also reminded Golob of the Iranian money laundering case, which was investigated by the man who is now sitting under his government.
The October Regular Session of the National Assembly opened with questions to the Prime Minister, Robert Golob. He answered questions on the rising cost estimates of the August floods, healthcare reform, the mismatch in social transfers and the Left party’s (Levica) call for recognition of Palestine as an independent state and for sanctions against Israel.
MP Breznik began by recalling the terrible consequences of the terrorist campaign of the Palestinian organisation Hamas, including the mass murder of civilians, and then the unanimous condemnation of these crimes, including the condemnation by the Prime Minister and the Minister of Foreign Affairs. But the condemnation in Slovenia has not been unanimous. Namely, it was followed by a letter from the Left party MP Matej T. Vatovec, who relativised the terrorist attack and even called for sanctions against Israel. “And then that was followed by the organisation of a protest by forty NGOs demanding the immediate withdrawal of support for the attacked Israel, which in turn means support for the terrorist group Hamas,” Breznik was clear. He therefore asked the Prime Minister two crucial questions. The first was, what is his response to the Left party coalition’s proposal to recognise Palestine and implement sanctions against an attacked Israel. The second was, what is his response to the NGOs’ call.
Breznik also recalled that Slovenia’s candidacy for the UN Security Council was one of the few projects that the government of Robert Golob took over from the previous one. He added: “You are the Prime Minister of a country that will start its mandate on the 1st of January 2024, as a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council; your opinion counts. You have stepped into big political shoes in the international and global arena, there is no room for feigning ignorance here,” said the SDS MP Franc Breznik, then showed a letter from 40 NGOs supporting the Iranian regime and accused Golob of generously funding them.
“It was precisely for the Iranian regime that the transitional left laundered more than a billion dollars through their bank, and the man who was responsible for looking into this money laundering is today sitting under your government, in the National Bureau of Investigation,” Breznik was critical. Golob replied that this was a political point-scoring exercise.
Breznik listed a number of documents sanctioning certain acts performed by the NGOs financed by Golob’s government, “Is the murder of 6 million Jews not enough?” commented Breznik, who believes that Slovenia should learn from history and the facts. “Do you have the conscience to stop funding groups that support terrorism?” asked the MP. He also asked the Prime Minister how he felt about the proposal by the coalition Left party to recognise Palestine and to implement sanctions against Israel, while the next question was, “How do you feel about the NGOs that you fund generously from the state budget, and which condemn Israel and want to see Palestine recognised?”
People have still not gotten the help they were promised
Aleksander Reberšek, a member of the New Slovenia Party (Nova Slovenija – NSi), asked the Prime Minister about the increase in the estimate of the cost of flood recovery, which has risen from an initial estimate of €500 million to almost €10 billion. On the basis of the estimates, which are not yet final, the government is already introducing new tax burdens for individuals and businesses. “All this raises doubts about the sincerity of the government’s moves and the transparency of the use of the funds raised for flood rehabilitation,” he said in announcing the question. He therefore plans on asking the Prime Minister when the final damage assessment and the financial construction of the rehabilitation will be known and which taxes the government still plans to introduce to implement the rehabilitation.
The leader of the NSi party parliamentary group, Janez Cigler Kralj, asked the Prime Minister whether he had already backed out of the healthcare reform, given that according to the government’s timetable, changes in the areas of digitalisation of healthcare, reform of the wage system for healthcare workers, and family and emergency medicine, were to come into force on the 1st of January 2024. However, this timeline does not seem to be materialising, and the government has just under two years left in office.
This is social populism
“Citizens will soon feel what social populism means in their pockets or in the form of lower net wages,” said Cigler Kralj, who added that even the new Minister of Health says that it is best to pour it into the health contribution of all employees and to raise the contribution, and this in addition to all the other burdens, said the NSi MP. Golob apparently took his question as an attack, as he arrogantly replied that the healthcare reform should be left to the profession, not debated in the National Assembly. However, so far, there are no results, judging by all the money that has been poured in by Golob’s government. He continued with the excuse that “things cannot be solved overnight.” Golob pointed out that when his government came in, they announced “an ambitious plan that will take two mandates,” and he admitted that they were too ambitious in their timetables and that they realised that “the team that was in the Ministry of Health was not meeting their expectations and the expectations of the voters and the electorate, so they changed it,” said Golob, who also said that it would take time to adjust to the new team. “We have reformed health insurance, this is the first step towards abolition,” Golob continued, adding that they have consciously transferred insurance from private to state.
“I understand that attack is the best defence,” Cigler Kralj told Golob, adding that they had looked and listened to each other several times on the subject of healthcare in a similar manner and that Golob himself had told him to ask as many questions as possible and to encourage him to work hard. Cigler Kralj then added that, apparently, Golob’s words are nothing but empty promises, and added that the NSi party does not believe that the concept of public healthcare is good for keeping up with the modern world.
Aleksander Reberšek, an NSi MP, then asked the Prime Minister about the rise in the estimate of the cost of flood relief, which had risen from an initial estimate of €500 million to almost €10 billion. On the basis of the estimates, which are not yet final, the government is already introducing new tax burdens for people and businesses. “All this raises doubts about the sincerity of the government’s moves and the transparency of the use of the funds raised for flood rehabilitation,” he said in announcing the question. He therefore plans on asking the Prime Minister when the final damage assessment and the financial construction of the rehabilitation will be known and which taxes the government still plans to introduce to implement the post-flood rehabilitation.
T. B.
