Last week, Smer SSD, the party of the former Slovak prime minister Robert Fico, won the general election held in the country, with nearly 23% of votes. It finished ahead of Progressive Slovakia, the pro-European party led by the young leader Michal Šimečka (with 18% of votes), and ahead of the social-democratic party Hlas–SD, led by Peter Pellegrini (with 14%; the party was born after splintering from Smer). Smaller parties received 5% and 9% of votes, respectively. In terms of seats, Fico will have to form a coalition, as his 42 MPs are far from the 76 seats needed for a majority in a the 150-seat National Council.
Fico’s comeback is astonishing for two reasons. First, Fico has been in power almost un-interruptedly between 2006 and 2018, when the killing of Jan Kuciak, an investigative journalist, cast a shadow on the Slovak government, as Kuciak had been writing articles about the relationships between Fico’s closest aides and the Calabrian mafia ‘Ndrangheta. A few months after that tragic event, Fico resigned and did not return to power, until now. Second, Fico’s party won the election with an openly anti-Ukrainian and pro-Russian campaign, in which he promised to stop sending weapons to Ukraine.
What are the implications of this victory? First of all, this is likely to break the unity of the European front in the unconditional support for Ukraine. Even Hungary, under Victor Orban, has not been able to achieve this goal. Now, Ukraine without the unwavering support of the US and the EU will not be able to stop the Russian aggression. Considering how many decisions need to be taken with a unanimous vote at the EU level, Fico’s victory represents a problem in this respect, at a time when Joe Biden is having a hard time passing fiscal legislation – including financial support for Ukraine – through Congress, under the Damocles’ sword of the US government shutdown.
Secondly, Fico’s return to power, with a pro-Russian stance, also risks breaking the unity of NATO against Russia, at a time when Turkish President Erdogan is asking Sweden further “concrete steps” against extremist organisations supposedly being harboured by the Scandinavian country, in return for removing the veto that Erdogan is holding against Sweden’s access to NATO. Again, for the US which is trying to re-organise the Western front for the long-lasting Cold War 2 against China, having rebellious pro-Russian partners in Europe and within NATO does not help. This is happening just as Lars-Hendrik Röller, the key economic adviser to to Angela Merkel when Merkel was German Chancellor, admitted that she left Germany too reliant on Russian gas.
The only positive piece of news for the pro-European parties in Europe is that the so-called Viségrad group, comprising Poland, Hungary, Czechia and Slovakia, is now more divided than ever. Poland and Hungary are under the procedure of Article 7 of the EU Treaties, for violation of key principles of the Union, including the rule of law and the independence of the judiciary. But while Poland is resolutely pro-Ukraine, Hungary and Slovakia have a more nuanced position. Czechia, which was leaning towards Russia under former PM Andrej Babis, has recently returned towards a more pro-European position under the leadership of President Petr Pavel.
All this shows that European political equilibria are continuously shifting and cannot be taken for granted. The situation may further evolve in coming years, especially if Marine Le Pen were to become the next French president in 2027.
