Slovak News Back to the news
Sulik Aims for Referendum to Be Held Along with Elections
Monday 25 January 2010 Zoom in | Print page
Bratislava, January 25 (TASR) - The petition committee for the Referendum 2009 initiative aims for the referendum to be held along with parliamentary or municipal elections (both 2010) and have turned to President Ivan Gasparovic on Monday with a letter to that effect.
The letter asks whether the president is planning to have the questions included in the referendum assessed by the country's Constitutional Court, according to head of the petition committee and chairman of the fledgling Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) party Richard Sulik.
"There are two options. Either the President will not turn to the Constitutional Court, in which case we'll file a request for calling the referendum, along with submitting the respective signatures, on February 17," said entrepreneur and former finance ministry advisor Sulik, adding that this would enable the referendum and the general election to be held on the same day (likely in June).
"The other option is that the President will turn to the court, in which case we'll file a request to call the referendum in late May, so that the referendum can take place on the day of the municipal election," Sulik added.
A total of 340,000 verified signatures have been deposited in an office of the petition committee. Based on information coming from throughout Slovakia, more than 350,000 signatures (needed to call a referendum) have already been collected, said Sulik, whose right-wing SaS fully supports using referendums as a democratic tool.
He added that he doesn't expect Gasparovic to hamper the calling of the referendum. "I'm certain that you, as a person thinking in democratic terms, care about the referendum's success," reads Sulik's letter to the president. [A total of six referendums have been held in Slovakia but the only one to receive the required 50-percent turnout to be valid was in 2003 and concerned joining the EU - ed. note]
If the Constitutional Court declares some of the planned referendum's six questions as counter-constitutional, the referendum will include the questions that are not censured.
In total, six questions are included: on abolishing television and radio concessionary fees, curbing MPs' immunity, downsizing the number of MPs from 150 to 100, setting the maximum purchasing price for cars used by Government officials, and helping to make voting in elections available via the internet. The sixth question concerns removing the right to reply of public officials (as included in the current Press Act of 2008).
All rights reserved. Any publishing or further dissemination of press releases and photographs from TASR's resources without TASR's prior written approval constitutes a violation of the Copyrights Act.
