PRAGUE – A populist former prime minister and his left-wing party have won Slovakia’s early parliamentary elections, staging a political comeback after campaigning on a pro-Russian and anti-American message, according to full results announced on Sunday.
Former Prime Minister Robert Fico and the left-wing Smer, or Direction, party had 22.9% of the vote, or 42 seats, in the 150-seat parliament, Slovakia’s statistics office said.
Polls and opinion polls predicted a close race, but in the end Fico won relatively comfortably after his campaign – considered the most aggressive and radical of his career – attracted voters who favored the far right.
Since no party can win a majority of seats, a coalition government must be formed. Traditionally, the president asks the winner of the election to form a government, so Fico is likely to become prime minister again. He was Prime Minister from 2006 to 2010 and again from 2012 to 2018.
Fico said he is ready to start talks with other parties about forming a coalition government as soon as President Zuzana Caputova asks him to do so. Caputova said she would do it on Monday.
“We are here, we are ready, we have learned something, we are more experienced,” he said.
Saturday’s election was a test of the small Eastern European country’s support for neighboring Ukraine in its war with Russia, and Fico’s victory could strain a fragile unit in the European Union and NATO.
Fico, 59, has vowed to withdraw Slovakia’s military support for Ukraine in its war against Russia if his bid to return to power is successful. “The people of Slovakia have bigger problems than Ukraine,” he said.
The country of 5.5 million people, founded in 1993 after the breakup of Czechoslovakia, has been a staunch supporter of Ukraine since Russia invaded last February, donating weapons and opening its borders to war refugees.
Slovakia has delivered its fleet of Soviet-era MiG-29 fighter jets, S-300 air defense system, helicopters, armored vehicles and much-needed demining equipment to Ukraine.
The current interim government plans to send artillery ammunition to Ukraine and train Ukrainian military personnel in demining.
In many countries it is becoming increasingly difficult to obtain approval for further arms deliveries to Ukraine. In the US Congress, a bill aimed at averting a government shutdown in Washington, DC, excluded President Joe Biden’s call for more security aid for the war-torn country.
Populist parties skeptical of intervention in Ukraine also enjoy significant support in other countries, including Germany, France and Spain. Many of these countries are facing national or regional elections that could shift the balance of public opinion from Kiev toward Moscow.
A liberal, pro-Western newcomer, the Progressive Slovakia party, came in second with 18% of the vote, or 32 seats.
Its leader Michal Simecka, deputy president of the European Parliament, said his party respected the result. “But it’s bad news for Slovakia,” he said. “And it would be even worse if Robert Fico managed to form a government.”
He said he would like to try to form a governing coalition if Fico fails.
The left-wing party Hlas (Voice), led by Fico’s former deputy in Smer, Peter Pellegrini, came third with 14.7% (27 seats). Pellegrini split from Fico after scandal-plagued Smer lost the last election in 2020, but their possible reunification would boost Fico’s chances of forming a government.
Pellegrini replaced Fico as prime minister after he was forced to resign following large anti-government street protests following the murder of journalist Jan Kuciak and his fiancée in 2018.
Pellegrini congratulated Fico on his victory but said two former prime ministers in one government might not work well. “It’s not ideal, but that doesn’t mean such a coalition can’t be formed,” he said.
Another potential coalition partner, the ultra-nationalist Slovak National Party, a clearly pro-Russian group, received 5.6% (10 seats).
These three parties would have a parliamentary majority of 79 seats if they formed a coalition government.
Fico is against EU sanctions against Russia, questions whether Ukraine can withdraw invading Russian troops and wants to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO. He suggests that the EU and US should use their influence to force Russia and Ukraine into a compromise peace deal instead of sending weapons to Kiev.
Fico’s critics fear that his return to power could lead Slovakia to abandon its course in a different way, following the path of Hungary under Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and, to a lesser extent, Poland under the Law and Justice party.
“It cannot be ruled out that he is looking for a partner who will use similar rhetoric, and the partner will be Viktor Orbán,” said Radoslav Stefancik, an analyst at the University of Economics in Bratislava.
Orbán welcomed Fico’s victory.
“Always good to work with a patriot,” he wrote on X, the former Twitter.
Hungary – unique among EU countries – maintains close relations with Moscow and opposes arms sales to Ukraine or economic aid.
Fico repeats Russian President Vladimir Putin’s unconfirmed claim that the Ukrainian government is running a Nazi state from which ethnic Russians in the east of the country need protection. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is Jewish and lost a relative in the Holocaust.
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Associated Press writer Justin Spike in Budapest, Hungary contributed to this report.