The covers and editorials from leading weeklies of the Left and Right for the work-week ending Friday, 18 February 2021. All our stories about coronavirus and Slovenia are here
Mladina: SMC and DeSUS MPs like Nazi collaborators
STA, 19 February 2021 - The left-wing magazine Mladina compares the Modern Centre Party (SMC) and DeSUS MPs following their decision not to vote out the Janez Janša government to Nazi collaborators in the editorial headlined We're All Lili Bayer.
Noting the vote and Janša's attack on the author of a Politico article about Janša's campaign against Slovenian media, the weekly writes that by supporting the government in Monday's vote the SMC assumed full responsibility for his and the government's actions.
It accuses the party of being "involved in the demolition of the rule of law, of putting up with political blockade of prosecutor appointments and actively supporting the government's interference in the media" through its representative who was appointed to head RTV Slovenija.
"Janša's attack on the journalist Lili Bayer has not gone unnoticed. Janša has now got their support and he feels strong [...] The SMC has thus assumed full responsibility for demolition of the Slovenian cultural space, Janša's attacks on media and the rule of law, for violence against citizens on the streets [...]. After Janša's attack on Lili Bayer no one in Europe no longer needs to be explained this government's attitude to the media."
The weekly asserts that like collaborators throughout Europe hoped ardently until the very last that the Nazi Germany would not lose the war, so are the SMC and DeSUS hoping that the economy would do well and people would forget and the government would not lose the election.
However, Mladina does not expect this will happen asserting that "the candies" they are distributing are ineffective.
It repeats that Slovenia's coronavirus record is one of the poorest in Europe, which it says is also because unlike elsewhere in Europe, Slovenia does not have border checks to prevent the import of coronavirus, while people are being fined for expressing their political views in front of the parliament building.
"It would be hard to find a more obvious proof that a large part of the ostensibly anti-epidemic measures is but an abuse of the epidemic for political purposes," something the paper says is also subject of questions from representatives of EU countries and institutions, who it says are worried that a man who attacked Bayer in such a crude way should represent the EU in the second half of the year.
Demokracija: Left's actions taking Slovenia to dark place
STA, 18 February 2021 - Monday's vote of no-confidence was yet another hallucination of the leftist parties, proving that they only know how to create the unnecessary, the right-wing Demokacija magazine says on Thursday. The proposal to oust the Janez Janša government was "completely superfluous" and a result of the left's obsession with and hate of Janša.
The left has not been successful at anything even if leftist activists and the entire mainstream media have provided it with more fuel than a Boeing 747 could take.
"That's why it ended as it did: with their 'ace' Karl Erjavec and a destructive parliamentary farce, Marjan Šarec, Luka Mesec, Tanja Fajon and Alenka Bratušek have turned into an exhibition item of a failed show," the right-wing weekly says under the headline Exhibition Item of Failed Show.
Although nobody denies the leftist opposition the right to file one no-confidence motion after another, it is hard to persuade it it is wrong.
Infatuated with its own truth, it does not acknowledge reality, including that the KUL coalition was never even close to the magic 46 votes needed to topple the centre-right government.
Demokracija believes Monday's vote was just one in a series of destructive acts that are to follow, including street violence by self-styled civil society activists.
"Dear leaders of the left opposition, you are full of talk about democracy and freedom, constantly stressing dialogue, often saying you want to talk. But do you?"
The leader of the centre-right government coalition has invited you to cooperation on a number of occasions, but you have turned him down with a policy of exclusion."
The weekly wonders with whom the left would be willing to talk. It says having two ideologically different sides is good, or else we would have closed-mindedness.
It accuses the left of demonising conservativism because it is bothered by views different than its own.
"Your demonisation of everything that might smell of conservativism shamefully assumes that some are less human, that they do not have the right to be different, that they must never come to power even if they have won the election."
It thus blames the left for death calls appearing in the streets and on social media, and on the facades of churches and of the homes of "wrong" MPs, as well as for "peaceful" protesters going wild and for the spread of the coronavirus.
The magazine says it is high time for the left opposition to stop being mean. "Continuing what you do can take Slovenia to a very dark place."
All our posts in this series are here
