Mood turns sour in former Euro-star
Once the star ofeuex-communist states, Slovenia isnowstruggling as political unrest increases in the face of a shrinkinggdpand rising unemployment.
The walls of the picturesque Slovenian city of Maribor on the banks of the Drava river are covered with graffiti reading ‘‘Gotof je!’’ – ‘‘He’s finished!’’.
They are a vivid illustration of the startling crisis that has hit a small country hailed until recently as the star of post-communist transition in eastern Europe and a promising new member of the eurozone.
The graffiti refer to Maribor’s mayor Franc Kangler. Thrown out of his party as prosecutors probed allegations of corruption, he is stepping down at the end of this month after two rallies against him turned violent – a sign of the times in a country unused to unrest but now gripped by economic pain and anger at an elite discredited by evidence of graft and cronyism.
New protests are planned.In the most serious violence since Slovenia’s two million people broke from Yugoslavia with limited bloodshed in 1991, several towns have seen trouble. In Maribor, the second city, dozens were arrested early this month after protesters hurling firecrackers and chunks of concrete clashed with riot police.
Until this year, Slovenia was widely seen as a calm and prosperous trailblazer among its more troubled neighbours in the former Yugoslavia. It joined the European Union in 2004 and three years later, as the IMF put it at the time, ‘‘sound macroeconomic policies were crowned with success when Slovenia entered the euro area’’— the first ex-communist state to do so.
Despite warnings from the IMF, underlying problems, stemming from generous state benefits, a rigid labour market or state support for favoured businesses, were largely hidden until the global crisis that hit Europe’s credit markets in late 2008.
Prime Minister Janez Jansa’s conservative
Gloss gone: coalition, which benefited from recession to oust the Centre-Left a year ago, faces no scheduled election until 2015. But the fury of the crowds against Kangler, a coalition ally, has revealed the weight of pressure for change and a potential for instability.
Protesters accuse Kangler, who took office in 2006 and was re-elected two years ago, of overseeing a corrupt administration that has sold municipal utilities and services to favoured partners while local people have lost jobs in the slump.
Kangler, who is under investigation by national anti- graft police, denies wrongdoing but announced this month he would step down on December 31 to make way for a new election for mayor.
‘‘Kangler was the cause of everything,’’ said protester, Primoz Horvat, 28. Unemployed for a year, he added: ‘‘The social situation in Maribor has hit rock-bottom.
‘‘People have no money for food while his own buddies are employed everywhere.’’
Among irritations to push people onto the streets was a city contract for a private company that installed speed cameras around Maribor in October. Hundreds of fines, typically of €250 (NZ$400) – an average week’s salary – were handed out on the first day, enraging motorists. Word that the private contractor would keep 90 per cent of the money caused new talk of graft.
The Maribor mayor is not unique in his legal problems. Premier Jansa himself faces a trial on charges of taking bribes from a Finnish arms exporter during a previous term in office. And Kangler’s counterpart in the capital Ljubljana has also been questioned over corruption allegations.
‘‘It seems it’s the same problem everywhere, only we were the first ones to rise,’’ said Maribor protester Horvat. ‘‘We need new faces. We’ve had the same people in power for 20 years.’’
Jansa’s opponent and predecessor as prime minister, Borut Pahor, was elected on December 2 to the figurehead role of president in a rebuff to a government less than a year old as it tries to impose spending cuts and welfare reforms to stave off a need to seek a bailout from EU partners.
Things went sour with the onset of the global downturn. From GDP growth in 2007 of 6.9 percent, the highest in the euro zone, Slovenia’s exportoriented economy hit a wall, weighed down by lack of demand at home and abroad and a credit crunch caused by mismanagement of local banks. The government expects GDP to shrink 2 per cent this year and a further 1.4 per cent in 2013.
With unemployment at 12.1 per cent, people are unhappy. Exporting Renault cars, Gorenje household appliances and drugs made by Krka and Lek, Slovenia’s per capita GDP had reached 91 per cent of the EU average in 2008, by far the highest among excommunist members. But it fell to 84 per cent by 2011.
‘‘No one in the country is answering the people’s cry for help,’’ says Kemo Saranovic.
‘‘Politicians behave as if they lived in an ivory tower and whatever they say should be the law, beyond reproach.’’