According to Vašečka, he owes his success to Fico. In turn, Fico expects Pellegrini to be loyal.
Fico is “an authoritarian person who values nothing more than loyalty,” Vašečka said. “At one point, Pellegrini was not loyal. And Fico never forgave him. Their relationship has never been good, and from 2020 it’s been outright bad.”
Fico himself once said that he “created” Pellegrini.
When Fico was forced to step down in 2018 after mass protests following the murder of investigative journalist Ján Kuciak and his fiancée Martina Kušnírová, Pellegrini replaced him as prime minister. His ambitions grew, and in June 2020 he announced he would split from Smer and create his own carbon-copy party, Hlas (Voice).
Since the October 2023 parliamentary election, which Fico won, Hlas has been a member of the Smer-led ruling coalition along with the far-right Slovak National Party (SNS), and has supported of all Smer’s decisions.
Government in crisis
Pellegrini’s rebellion against Fico is therefore a sign that the governing coalition is undergoing more serious turmoil.
Fico’s government currently has only a razor-thin majority of 76 out of 150 MPs in the parliament after three SNS MPs quit their caucus in October due to internal disputes. The trio threaten to withhold support for the coalition until it meets their demands.
In another rift, Hlas and the SNS have squabbled over the post of speaker of parliament, which was previously held by Pellegrini before he won the presidency.
To add to the coalition’s misery, a pro-European opposition liberal party, Progressive Slovakia, has been rising in the polls and in December had the support of 24.8 percent of eligible voters, with Smer trailing behind on 19.1 percent, a sign of the depth of voter discontent with government policies — notably the introduction of a large tax package. Fico hinted at a Smer party congress in November that he might call a snap election.
Fico’s office did not reply to a request to comment, nor did any of his MPs.
Pellegrini’s spokesperson denied there was any discord between Fico and Pellegrini, and told POLITICO that the president remained “a stabilizing and unifying element on the Slovak political scene.”
“As the directly elected president, he has a mandate from the people to defend their interests,” the spokesperson said. “He is therefore ready to appreciate if the government fulfils these interests through its actions, and is equally ready to be critical if the government deviates from this task.”
