Gasparovic Wins as Slovaks Reject One-Time PariahBRATISLAVA, Slovakia (Reuters) - Slovaks rejected a return to power of hard-line nationalist former Prime Minister Vladimir Meciar in a presidential runoff vote, choosing the more moderate Ivan Gasparovic as the country heads into the European Union.
The electoral committee said on Sunday that preliminary official results showed Gasparovic, a former political ally of Meciar, took 59.91 percent of the vote in Saturday's election. Many Slovaks characterized the election as a choice between the lesser of two evils. The West assailed Meciar for what it viewed as his anti-democratic rule in the mid-1990s. Elected to a five-year term, the center-left Gasparovic, 63, will lead Slovakia as it heads into the European Union on May 1 along with nine other mainly post-Communist nations. Much of Gasparovic's campaign was built around criticizing the current center-right government and its reforms. He has been vague on what he would do if elected. The president holds a largely ceremonial position but he has a crucial veto that could cause problems for the government as it tries to push through EU-inspired reforms. Gasparovic immediately pledged to try to find common ground with center-right Prime Minister Mikulas Dzurinda and said he wanted Slovakia's integration into the EU to be smooth. "Work with Prime Minister Dzurinda and parliamentary speaker Pavol Hrusovsky will not always easy, but for the sake of Slovaks we need to work together to make these relations run properly and correctly," he said. Financial markets had prepared for a Meciar victory -- the one-time amateur boxer took the first round in the vote -- and analysts said the result was likely to be slightly positive for the crown currency in the short-term. MID-JUNE Gasparovic will take office in mid-June from President Rudolf Schuster, eliminated in the first round of voting. Wary diplomats who once shunned Slovakia when Meciar ruled and Gasparovic was at his side as parliamentary speaker said that deeds, not words, were needed to allay fears that he will hinder Slovakia's integration with the EU and the NATO security alliance, which it joined last month. "The election is obviously an internal affair, and the voters have fairly and democratically made their choice. We will see how Mr. Gasparovic approaches EU integration, and I hope and believe he will not be a problem," said one western diplomat. Meciar, once a political pariah in the West, had hoped to convince the electorate he was a changed man, made wiser and less combative by experience. But voters appeared to have rejected his image makeover, instead opting for Gasparovic despite his Communist past and close association with the Meciar administration. Meciar's loss was also a blow to Dzurinda's four-party coalition government. Gasparovic edged out Foreign Minister Eduard Kukan in the first round of voting and has been backed by the populist opposition SMER party of Robert Fico. "I don't think the result will cause an extraordinary change to how the coalition rules. Gasparovic will try to influence the legislative process, but he won't control it," said Pavel Haulik, a political analyst at the polling agency MVK. "But it will now be key for the coalition to resolve its internal problems and be more united to keep Fico's party from gaining an upper hand," he added.
Bickering within the coalition has cost the government its majority in parliament and has slowed the adoption of reforms. It has also raised fears among analysts that the government may not hold together until the end of its term in autumn 2006. |
