Seventy-three athletes will represent Slovakia at this year's Winter Olympics, more than ever before in Slovakia's independenthistory. Slovaks will compete in the men's and women's ice hockey, downhill and cross-country skiing, ski jump, biathlon, fig-ure skating, luge and bobsleigh. On January 27, the athletes met Slovak President Ivan Gašparovič. Photo: TASR

Political pollraises

eyebrows

THE FIRST survey of the New Year, as the Junenational elections approach, to ask about thepopularity of Slovakia’s political parties pro-duced a surprise when its results showed a rel-atively small newcomer in the political arena,the Freedom and Solidarity party (SaS), rank-ing third. At the same time, the poll confirmedthat the dominant party in the ruling coali-tion, Smer, enjoys widespread public support,with over 40 percent of those polled sayingthey would support it. But poll results releaseda few days later by another survey agency sug-gest that SaS should not become too euphoric.

The MVK polling agency released the res-ults of its poll on January 25, showing thatSmer would have been preferred by 42 percentof those polled if the elections had been held inJanuary. The Slovak Democratic and ChristianUnion (SDKÚ) came in second with 9.4 percentsupport and SaS, which had previously polledaround 5 percent support, climbed up to 9.2percent and came out as the third strongestparty according to MVK’s survey.

See UP pg 3

SaS ranks third in firstopinion poll of 2010

Bizarre twist in emissions deal

FOR A MOMENT it seemed like somereal, breathing people were emergingfrom the fog surrounding the US-based garage firm Interblue Group –the company which boughtSlovakia’s excess emission quotas foran amount well below the price re-ceived by neighbouring countries fortheir quotas in a deal that has beenheavily criticised for more than a yearand has cost two environment minis-ters their jobs.

However, the January 20 meetingbetween representatives of the SlovakEnvironment Ministry and InterblueGroup (Europe), a new Swiss companythat had apparently morphed from theobscure US-based firm, produced littlein the way of concrete results otherthan the resignation of the only pub-licly-seen representative of Interblue.That representative, Jana Lütken, saidshe did not resign because of the dealitself, but because of what she called aserious injury caused to her by a Slov-ak television crew. A political ethicswatchdog group said that Lutken andInterblue are merely doing everythingpossible to delay resolution of the is-sues surrounding the contract.

Slovakia has been attempting tosecure a €15 million bonus paymentfrom Interblue Group for having spentthe original proceeds from the contracton so-called green projects. The con-tract with Interblue included a clausethat if Slovakia spent the funds fromthe sale of its emissions quotas withinthe ‘Green Investment Scheme’ (GIS),the country would be eligible for a bo-nus payment of €1 per tonne, or €15million in total.

The Slovak government has said thatits nationwide thermal insulation pro-gramme, funded with proceeds from thecontract, falls under the GIS scheme.

See GIS pg 4

Vol. 16, No. 4 Monday, February 1, 2010 - Sunday, February 7, 2010

FOCUSof this issue

On sale nowOn sale now FOCUSof this issue

from page 6

CENTRAL SLOVAKIA

NEWS

Oppositon ralliesThe leaders of all Slovakia'scentre-right oppositionparties shared a joint stage tocriticise the present govern-ment at a demo in Bratislava.

pg 2

Fico targets ex-ministerThe prime minister has at-tacked former transport min-ister Pavol Prokopovič forsigning long-term deals afterhis party had lost the 2006election.

pg 3

OPINION

The foul air of prejudiceTensions between minoritiesand the majority population,instead of dwindling, risk be-ing inflamed by thoughtlessor mendacious politicians.The Roma community inSlovakia and elsewhere isparticularly vulnerable.

pg 5

BUSINESS FOCUS

Žilina RegionThe recently re-elected pres-dient of the Žilina Self-Gov-erning Region, Juraj Blanár,talks to The Slovak Spectatorabout his priorities.

pg 6

Banská Bystrica RegionVladimír Maňka, the newpresident of the BanskáBystrica Self-Governing Re-gion, explains how he plans totackle regional disparities.

pg 7

A wealth of attractionsCentral Slovakia has hugetourist potential, boasting an-cient mining towns, like UN-ESCO-listed Banská Štiavnica,mountains, forests, spas andski resorts.

pg 8

CULTURE

Foxes on the red carpetFoxes, a new family dramaabout young Slovaks livingand working in Ireand, isenjoying positive responses atfilm festivals around Europe.

pg 11

SSELECT FOREX RATES€ benchmark as of January 28

CANADA CAD 1.48 CZECH REP. CZK 26.23RUSSIA RUB 42.47GREAT BRITAIN GBP 0.86

HUNGARY HUF 271.30JAPAN JPY 126.36POLAND PLN 4.07USA USD 1.40

Old scandal spellsnew trouble for SDKÚ

PRIME Minister Robert Fico’s decisionto dig up a long-dormant case concern-ing unexplained financing of the op-position Slovak Democratic and Chris-tian Union (SDKÚ), and to season itwith some new information aboutwhat he called money laundering, ficti-tious firms and tax-haven bank ac-counts, has signalled that the politicalfight in the lead-up to this year’s par-liamentary election will be mercilessand possibly dirty. With the renewedclaims, aired in mid January, Fico nowasserts that the SDKÚ, which has ac-cused his own ruling coalition of cor-ruption and theft, channelled moneythrough foreign accounts supervised byits officials.

While observers suggest that Fico istrying to overshadow some of the still-smoking political scandals generatedby the ruling coalition of Smer, theSlovak National Party (SNS) and the

Movement for a Democratic Slovakia(HZDS), the prime minister’s accusa-tions have prompted SDKÚ leaderMikuláš Dzurinda to file a criminalcomplaint against him.

However, Dzurinda publicly admit-ted that his party is unable to answer allthe questions that journalists are ask-ing about the party’s financingbetween 2000 and 2004.

“We are sorry about it,” Dzurindasaid shortly after Fico reopened theSDKÚ party financing issue. The primeminister called Dzurinda’s confession“political suicide”. Dzurinda, in de-fence of his party, said that back in 2000the law did not oblige political parties

to publish annual reports on party fin-ancing or the names of their donors.

Fico opened up the SDKÚ financingcase on January 22, after a four-and-a-half-year lacuna. The case involved aso-far unexplained transaction whichhelped the party to clear its then-Sk22million (approximately €730,000, atcurrent exchange rates) debt and at thesame time allowed it to sell its MedenáStreet property for Sk27 million (ap-proximately €896,000, at current ex-change rates). Fico initially suggestedthat the unidentified owners of Swissbank accounts and shell firms in taxhavens were involved in the deal.

Then, on January 27, Fico claimedthat the SDKÚ is controlled by shellcompanies based in London, with CEOsoperating in tax havens and holdingaccounts in Swiss banks.

See CASH pg 2

BY BEATA BALOGOVÁSpectator staff

New playerto take to

Slovak skies

THE SKIES over Slovakia are to get a new fam-ily of metal birds. Beginning May 17 the rangeof airlines offering long-haul flights fromBratislava Airport with just one stopover willwiden. From that date, the Polish nationalairline LOT will begin flying to its main hub,Warsaw, using a 46-seat, turbo-prop planeevery day except Saturday. Later, they plan touse a jet aeroplane that will be faster andmore comfortable.

“We had a big increase in passengers in theregion,” Jolanta Grala-Bednárčik, head of LOTfor Slovakia and the region, said as she ex-plained why the company was returning tothe region after a six-year break. “In the CzechRepublic and in Slovakia, our sales increasedby about 15 percent, in spite of the generalmarket slump.”

Its return to M. R. Štefánik InternationalAirport in Bratislava is also supported by theenhanced interest of Slovaks in LOT flightsfrom Vienna, Krakow and Prague. Accordingto calculations by the Polish airline, last yeartheir interest increased by 40 percent whencompared to 2008.

See BIRD pg 4

BY ADAM VALČEKSpecial to the Spectator

BY BEATA BALOGOVÁSpectator staff

BY MICHAELA STANKOVÁSpectator staff

CASH: Linked to UK firms, Swiss accountsContinued from pg 1

“There is a serious suspicion that theSDKÚ transferred abroad commissions fromprivatisation of strategic companies andcovered them by [using] fictive firms andtoday is using them to finance its activities,”Fico said.

The claims relate to a historical loan ofseveral hundred thousand euros to the SDKÚfrom a London-based firm, Allied Wings, es-tablished only a few months before thetransaction. The firm’s basic capital thenstood at Sk350,000 (approximately €11,600,at current exchange rates) and its scope ofbusiness was not loan provision, accordingto the Sme daily. Fico claimed that the firmwas dissolved last June, shortly after he sug-gested that he would disseminate informa-tion about money laundering, Sme wrote.

According to Fico, Allied Wings is linkedto another company, Destor Investments,since both firms are based in London andhave the same founder and secretary. DestorInvestments is the owner of 100 percent ofthe shares in another company, Involve,which owns the SDKÚ party logo. IgorKucej, the main treasurer of the SDKÚ, isthe authorised representative of Involve.The address of the director of Destor In-vestments is recorded as being in Dubai, ac-cording to Fico.

“The circle is closed,” said Fico, as quotedby Sme. “If the finance-master of the SDKÚis the authorised representative of a fictiveEnglish firm, Destor Investments, he alsohas a connection with Allied Wings, whichprovided a loan to the SDKÚ. The partywhich is accusing us of theft and corruptionis sending money from foreign accounts un-der the supervision of SDKÚ people.”

The SDKÚ financing scandal originallybroke in 2005. Between 2003 and 2004 an-other company, Soul, with basic capital ofSk200,000 (approximately €6,600, at cur-rent exchange rates) took over the party’sSk22 million debt and also paid for theparty’s building, thus providing Dzurinda’sparty with about Sk50 million (approxim-ately €1.66 million, at current exchangerates). Fico suggested that the SDKÚ hadtransferred part of the money received fromSoul to an account of Allied Wings held atCredit Suisse, a Swiss bank, the SITAnewswire wrote.

The SDKÚ claims that this was repay-ment of a loan of €404,000, with 7 percentinterest rate, which they had taken in Au-

gust 2000. However, the party has producedneither the loan contract nor informationabout Allied Wings, SITA wrote. The primeminister stressed that Allied Wings emergedon January 13, 2000, only a couple of monthsbefore it provided the loan to the SDKÚ.

“It is not possible that a postal box inLondon with a director in Saint Christopherand Nevis [a Caribbean island state] providesa loan worth millions to the SDKÚ withouthaving the account of an SDKÚ representat-ive with illegal money behind it,” Fico said,as quoted by SITA.

After Fico published the first informa-tion, Dzurinda said that his party hadalready paid the price twice for unansweredquestions pertaining to his party’s financingbetween 2000 and 2004: once in 2002, andagain in 2006, in the parliamentary elec-tions. Since then, the party’s financing hasbeen completely transparent, he said.

“We did not hurt or harm anyone,” saidDzurinda. “We did not scratch a singleheller [one hundredth of a Slovak crown]from this state.”

However, on January 26 Dzurinda alsosaid that he has never really handled the fin-ancing of his party and that he deals withparty financing only once a year. The SDKÚchairman has said that the attacks can be at-tributed to Fico’s efforts to divert attentionfrom the scandals of the ruling coalition andto intimidate the opposition.

“If the political party I lead has commit-ted a crime, why does a policeman, prosec-utor, or the chief of the anti-corruption unitnot announce the start of criminal proceed-ings? Why has the prime minister been sig-nalling this since last June, only to an-nounce it at a press conference today [Janu-ary 22], as a politician?” Dzurinda told thepublic service Slovak Radio. “This is proofthat Fico does not care about the rule of law.”

Shortly after Fico’s January 27 press con-ference, the SDKÚ said that it was filing acriminal complaint against Fico.

However, Sme journalists reported thatthey had not, so far, received any answersfrom the SDKÚ about why its logo is ownedby Involve, which in turn is owned by a for-eign firm, and not by the party. The paperasked why Involve, for which SDKÚ treas-urer Kucej is the authorised representative,is owned by Destor Investments.

Political scientist Miroslav Kusý told TheSlovak Spectator that even if suspicions re-main about the SDKÚ’s funding, Fico’s ef-forts are nothing but an effort to obscure the

current government’s scandals by bringingup older issues.

“It now depends on how the SDKÚ pur-sues newer cases, which are there but whichFico denies,” said Kusý.

The Fico government has still not shedlight on the suspicious sale of Slovakia’s ex-cess emission quotas to an obscure firm, In-terblue Group, whose registered address wasa lock-up garage in the USA, while a scandalin which Slovak police planted live explosivein the luggage of an unsuspecting Slovak cit-izen who then carried the explosive to Ire-land is still smoking. Labour Minister VieraTomanová, a nominee of Fico’s Smer party, isalso under fire over problems with the func-tioning of the so-called ‘social companies’scheme backed by Smer.

Kusý also noted that at the time whenthese cases emerged, the regulations weredifferent and publishing information wasnot obligatory. Nonetheless, he expects Ficoto continue stirring the case.

“It is in fact a 6-year old case, which atthe time when it broke out evoked consider-able distress,” said Kusý. “Though the publicprosecutor closed the case down the primeminister has now has reopened it.”

Fico promised to reveal further inform-ation.

The director of political ethics watchdogthe Fair-Play Alliance, Zuzana Wienk, toldThe Slovak Spectator that the explanationSDKÚ has provided is not satisfactory at all.However, she also suggested that Fico hasbeen using very strong words and if hestands behind them, he should have filed acriminal complaint.

“The fact is that the SDKÚ has never ex-plained suspicions of non-transparent fin-ancing and many open issues remain aboutwhy the concealed patrons helped the party;how they were rewarded and whether theparty did not have a whole system of firmsabroad which helped the party with its fin-ancial situation,” Wienk said.

According to Wienk, if the party wantsto prevent a loss of public trust and the re-vival of these scandals it should investigatethe case internally and draw personal re-sponsibility, which would mean replacingthe leadership with new faces and adoptingnew rules of behaviour.

Prosecutor General Dobroslav Trnka con-firmed to the financial daily HospodárskeNoviny on January 27 that his office hasbeen collecting material regarding the caseand has requested material from SDKÚ.

Opposition rallies at demo

THE NEARING elections and theaccumulating scandals of the rul-ing government coalition causedat least a little bit of noise in Brat-islava on the afternoon of Sat-urday, January 23. A protestdemonstration with the theme“We like this country but wedon’t like this government” re-portedly attracted between 500and 1,000 people to Bratislava’scentral SNP Square. The crowdwas made up of citizen activistsaided by the centre-right opposi-tion parties.

The organisers of the demon-stration were two rather well-known Slovak activists, OndrejDostál, the director of the Con-servative Institute of Milan Ras-tislav Štefánik and a vice-chair-man of the Civic ConservativeParty (OKS), and Alojz Hlina, whohas recently become well knownas an outspoken critic of JánSlota, the head of the Slovak Na-

tional Party (SNS). They werebacked by the Civic DemocraticYouth movement.

Hlina said the protest pulledtogether people who like Slov-akia, their country, but are wor-ried about the direction it hastaken. Hlina added that he thinksSlovakia is headed towards bigproblems. He again sharply criti-cised Slota, who the day beforethe protest had been videotapedin an apparently intoxicatedstate in the parliament building

by reporters from the Plus JedenDeň daily.

“Fico is taking our moneyfrom us, too much of our money,and gives it away to his friends,”Dostál said. “We are here todaybecause we don’t like that and wewant to change it.”

The protest, originally organ-ised by activists, was laterpresented as a protest by the op-position political parties becausethe leaders of all the centre-rightparties met on the stage, an un-

usual event for the Slovak opposi-tion in recent years.

“I think it was a kind of suc-cess to get all those leaders thereon one stage together,” politicalanalyst Grigorij Mesežnikov toldThe Slovak Spectator. “Because inthat way they are showing thatthey are close to each other –their programmes and their val-ues – and that if they were to getthe chance of coalition coopera-tion, they would take it.”

The opposition leaders dishedout some harsh criticism of theruling coalition.

“We have a government thatis neither national, social norpopular,” said Mikuláš Dzurinda,the leader of the Slovak Demo-cratic and Christian Union(SDKÚ). “We’ve got a governmentthat is populist, thievish andincompetent.”

Ján Figeľ, head of the Chris-tian Democratic Movement(KDH), said he likes Slovakiaand he wants it to serve its cit-izens through its institutionsand not misuse the state’spower against them.

See SNP pg 5

Slovaks rue social conflict with RomaSLOVAKS regard ethnic ten-sions as more powerful thanany other kind of social conflictin the country, according to theInternational Social SurveyProgramme (ISSP) 2009-2010conducted by the sociology de-partment of the SlovakAcademy of Sciences.

According to the 1,159 re-spondents surveyed, conflictsbetween the majority popula-tion and the Roma minority arethe most bitter, followed bytensions between Slovaks andethnic Hungarians and thosebetween well-off people andthose with lower incomes.

Slovaks considered the firsttwo areas of conflict to be themost publicised social andpolitical problems in Slovakia,the TASR newswire wroteabout the survey results.

According to Ján Bunčákfrom the sociology departmentof the Philosophy Faculty ofBratislava’s Comenius Uni-versity, who presented the res-ults of the survey, the tensionbetween Slovaks and ethnicHungarians has been “signific-antly politicised”.

To support his assertion, hepointed to the fact that thiskind of tension was reportedmost often by people fromŽilina, who he noted are un-likely be directly affected by in-teracting with ethnic Hungari-ans because very few live inŽilina Region.

Almost two-thirds ofSlovakia’s inhabitants arehappy with their lives; Slovaksmore so than Roma or ethnicHungarians, the Sme daily re-ported.

NEWS in short

2 February 1 – 7, 2010 NEWS

Alojz Hlina speaks to the crowd in Bratislava's SNP Square. Photo: ČTK

Unwitting 'courier' to be compensatedA MAN from Poprad who flewto Dublin with high explosivein his luggage after it had beenout there without his know-ledge by police wants InteriorMinister Robert Kaliňák not topublish the amount he is to re-ceive as compensation for theinconvenience he experienced,the TASR newswire reported.

“I’m holding talks with theministry on this matter and, asI wish to have my privacy pro-tected, I’ve asked ministerKaliňák not to inform the pub-lic about the amount ofcompensation,” Štefan Gonda,an electrician, wrote in astatement for the media,quoted by the TASR newswire.

Ninety grammes of explos-ive were in Gonda’s luggagewhen he arrived in Dublin on aDanube Wings flight that leftPoprad on January 2. Police at

Poprad Airport had hidden ex-plosives in the luggage of sev-eral unsuspecting passengersas part of a security operation.However, a package of explos-ive was stuck in the straps ofGonda’s bag and was not re-moved before he boarded theplane.

The 49-year-old man waslater arrested in Ireland butthen released without charge.Gonda has recently started talk-ing to the media and has con-firmed the interior minister’sclaim that the explosive wasnot inside his luggage butrather stuck on the straps of hisrucksack.

“I checked my backpackand after a while found a smallplastic bag with a grey sub-stance in the straps in thelumbar area,” Gonda said, asquoted by the SITA newswire.

Guantánamo detainees enter SlovakiaTHREE detainees from the USfacility in Guantánamo Bay,Cuba arrived in Slovakia earlyon the morning of January 25,the spokesman for the PoliceCorps Presidium, MartinKorch, told the TASR newswire.

Contrary to rumours, Korchsaid that the three were not in aconvoy that went to the refugeecamp in Humenné, in PrešovRegion, the day before.

“The convoy was part ofcover measures aimed at ensur-ing their smooth transfer,” saidKorch.

He added that the policewould not provide any furtherinformation about the threeformer detainees.

The Slovak government’sdecision to accept three prison-ers from the USA'sGuantánamo Bay facility wasannounced by Slovak ForeignAffairs Minister MiroslavLajčák on January 19.

The three detainees fromGuantánamo represent nothreat to Slovak citizens, saidKeith Eddins, US charged'affaires to Slovakia.

The identity of the three isbeing withheld at the requestof the Slovak government.

The US government askedEU countries to help find placesfor detainees that could be jus-tifiably released from the de-tention centre.

Slovak rescuers save French diplomatSHORTLY after a rescue teamfrom Slovakia landed in Port-au-Prince, Haiti on January 24,its members were quicklycalled into action, with the taskof helping to extinguish a burn-ing car occupied by the Frenchambassador to Haiti.

Slovak rescuers managed tohelp the ambassador escapefrom the burning car withoutany serious injuries, the SlovakMinistry of Foreign Affairs told

the media.Slovakia dispatched an

18-member rescue and health-care team, along with a fieldhospital and humanitarian ma-terial aid, to Haiti on January22, via Paris, in cooperationwith the French Interior Min-istry. Haiti suffered a devastat-ing earthquake on January 12.

Compiled by Spectator staff

from press reports

BY MICHAELA STANKOVÁSpectator staff

4 February 1 – 7, 2010 BUSINESS / NEWS

Cargo Slovakia to reduce one shiftRAILWAY freight companyCargo Slovakia (ZSSK Cargo)and its employee representat-ives agreed to a working weekwhich will be reduced by oneshift beginning February 1 dueto work obstacles on theemployer’s part, the SITAnewswire reported.

The working week of staffmembers who work on avariable working cycle willchange beginning March 1,with employees receivingcompensation of 70 percentof their standard salaries, thecompany’s spokeswoman,Margaréta Grecová, toldSITA.

The firm expects its cargotransport this year to increaseby about 10 percent from 2009,a year in which the companyrecorded a drop of about 30 per-cent in its cargo transport.

Due to the economic crisisand its subsequent recordslump in performance, CargoSlovakia estimates that itclosed 2009 with losses of €120million, about 10 percent lessthan the €133 million loss pro-jected earlier.

Last year, more than 600employees left the company onthe basis of employment ter-mination agreements and re-ceived severance compensation.

East-west highway promised 'by 2012'ECONOMY Minister ĽubomírJahnátek told South KoreanAmbassador Seok-soong Seothat Slovakia’s first highwayconnecting Bratislava andKošice will be finished by late2012 instead of 2010, the datefirst promised by Prime Minis-ter Robert Fico when heentered office in June 2006, theSITA newswire reported.

The minister told the am-bassador that the highway’scompletion by the end of 2012would significantly improveconditions for foreign invest-ments in eastern Slovakia,SITA wrote.

However, the 2012 dateoffered by the minister appar-ently does not include comple-tion of several final sections ofthe D1 highway which involvetunnels and complex engineer-ing projects that are inclduedin the third public-privatepartnership (PPP) highwayconstruction package.

According to the concessionagreement for D1 constructionin the third PPP package signed

on January 22 by the TransportMinistry and representatives ofthe contractor, ŽilinskáDiaľnica, the highway sectionsbetween Hričovské Podhradieand Lietavská Lúčka, LietavskáLúčka and Višňové, Višňovéand Dubná Skala and fromLietavská Lúčka to Žilina willbe finished only after 2012.

The first two sections willopen for traffic in spring 2013,according to the agreement’stimetable. The remaining twosections, including a tunnelabout 8 kilometres longbetween Višňové and DubnáSkala, are slated for completionby autumn 2014.

Completion of the entirehighway, which will beSlovakia's first multi-lane linkbetween the capital andKošice, Slovakia's secondlargest city, has slipped severaltimes since Fico made his ori-ginal election-time pledge tofinish it by this year.

Compiled by Spectator staff

from press reports

BUSINESS in short

Truckers say they will strike again

THE UNION of Slovak Road Car-riers (UNAS), which recentlyorganised various protestsagainst Slovakia’s new e-tollcollection system, has issued astrike notice for February 1, foran indefinite period.

The truckers say they havedone so to voice their dissatis-faction with the 1,400 kilo-metres of first-class roads onwhich a toll is now charged, theSITA newswire reported.

UNAS says that tolls shouldbe paid only on 333 kilometresof first-class roads that runparallel to highways and dualcarriageways.

The head of UNAS’s organ-isational committee, JaroslavPolaček, said they are still de-manding suspension of all e-tolls until the end of June.

The small and medium-sized trucking firms will re-main on strike alert until Feb-ruary 1 and until then they areprepared to talk about theirdemands with competent au-thorities, SITA wrote.

According to SITA, a truck-ers’ strike has support fromthe National Association ofEmployers (RÚZ), the SlovakTrade Chamber and the Asso-

ciation of Entrepreneurs ofSlovakia.

Transport MinisterĽubomír Vážny has already re-jected the truckers’ demand toreduce the size of the networkof first-class roads that are sub-ject to tolls as well as their de-mand to pay only for actualkilometres driven and not forwhole sections.

After the negotiationsVážny stated that if a vehicledoes not use the whole meas-ured section of a tolled road anddeparts from part of it, thevehicle will not pay a full toll orwill have a zero toll-rate forthat section.

“This means a certain con-cession from the state as well ashaving to deal with lost reven-ue for that section,” Vážny said.

Beginning in February,vehicles are expected to pay e-tolls on first-class roads for 1,006modified sections which are 5kilometres in maximum lengthand beginning in April on 1,700shortened sections with an av-erage length of 700 metres.

According to Vážny, this isthe maximum concession thatthe government can make to-wards the trucking firms.

BIRD: LOT and airport enter joint dealContinued from pg 1

LOT left the Slovak market in September2004 due to strong competition from thenow-defunct SkyEurope Airlines on its routeto Warsaw.

“Warsaw is not a destination for two aircarriers,” Grala-Bednárčik told The SlovakSpectator. According to aviation analyst VítDoležálek, LOT’s route from Bratislava toWarsaw could be secure if at least 20 people flythere for an onward connection to America.

LOT thinks that as many as 60 percent ofthe total number of passengers flying fromBratislava could be trans-Atlantic clients. Lastyear, the Polish air carrier transported almost4 million passengers and about 2.4 million ofthem travelled to the US or Canada.

The Polish capital is a hub from whichclients can fly to two airports in New York, toChicago, or to Toronto in Canada. The Polishcompany says that passengers should waitno longer than two hours for a connectingflight in Warsaw.

Passengers will pay €142 for a roundtripBratislava-Warsaw flight, including airportfees, which is interesting, especially for busi-ness clients, says Lukáš Švaro fromPelikán.sk, an internet seller of flight tickets.“Prices of tickets are approximately the sameas with other air carriers, so it will dependmainly on the marketing activities of the Pol-ish company whether it will manage to at-tract clients,” Švaro told The Slovak Spectator.

LOT says that the price of a roundtrip tick-et to the US should begin at €456 and toCanada, it will be €497. However, LOT’s inter-net booking system for the route fromWarsaw currently states a price of €1,500. ThePolish company will have a competitor in theform of ČSA Czech Airlines, which flies fromBratislava, Žilina and Košice to Prague.

Last year, about 200,000 people travelledby air between Slovakia and the Czech Repub-lic; LOT would be pleased to have about 20,000a year. ČSA terminated its own route fromPrague to New York last year and now onlyoperates this route in cooperation with DeltaAirlines, a part of the SkyTeam alliance. Aroundtrip ticket to New York through Praguefor the end of June 2010 is priced at €1,500, thesame as that offered by LOT.

Švaro expressed his conviction that thefinal share captured by LOT in the Slovakmarket will depend on its marketing activ-ities. Currently, the Polish carrier ranksfifteenth in the number of tickets sold onthe Pelikán.sk website. ČSA is among thefirst five.

LOT comes to Bratislava Airport withmodest expectations. It hopes to fly 20,000passengers on its line to Warsaw. Its de-mands from the airport were modest, also.Unlike several low-cost air carriers, LOT didnot ask for any rebates or concessions fromBratislava Airport. However, it did notcommit to transporting a certain number ofpassengers in its contract.

The cooperation of the Polish airline com-pany with Bratislava Airport has another ad-vantage, however. “We decided on a jointmarketing campaign, as this is crucial for us.We do not have such wide possibilities for ad-vertisement and promotion as the airportdoes. So its offer of a common marketingcampaign was a big advantage for us,” Grala-Bednárčik told the Sme daily in an interview.

During the interview, Grala-Bednárčikdid not rule out the possibility that LOT wouldalso fly from Košice. She said everything is amatter of strategic planning. “These are long-term plans that depend on whether this routewill be profitable,” she said.

LOT’s decision to head for Slovakia alsorevealed some new information about theprivatisation process that was launched atthe beginning of 2009 for the state-ownedairline company.

She confirmed during the interview thatone of the potential bidders for ownership ofLOT is KLM/Air France. “We are striving for itto become a strategic partner, but not neces-sarily an investor or owner,” she stated in theinterview.

She specified that the company has beennegotiating with several airline companiesand with financial groups. “[It is] hard to saywhether in the end it will be one of the air-lines or a financial group,” she commented.She said the Polish government has not in-tervened in a direct way in negotiations withany potential investor.

GIS: Interblue figure 'resigns'Continued from pg 1

The US-based InterblueGroup ceased to exist on Decem-ber 29, 2009 and the rights andobligations of the firm were ap-parently transferred to InterblueGroup (Europe), based in Switzer-land. When The Slovak Spectatorwent to print on January 28 theministry had not released anyrelevant documentation showingthe legal successor to InterblueGroup LLC, which had been re-gistered in Washington State inthe USA. According to JanaKaplanová, director of the Envir-onment Ministry’s communica-tions department, the partiesagreed on January 20 that thisdocumentation would beprovided by January 31.

The Environment Ministrywas otherwise rather tight-lipped about the nature of thediscussions at the meeting heldat Slovakia’s general consulate inZurich, Switzerland.

“We want to emphasise thatfundamental progress has beenmade in resolving the issue ofSlovakia’s emissions quotas,”read an Environment Ministrystatement released on January21.

“In association with the con-tinuation of the cancellation ofthe legal-trade relationship, theauthorised representative of thegroup said that Interblue GroupEurope will continue negotiationonly through a legal representat-ive whose name would be an-nounced by the end of January,”the ministry also said in thestatement.

Kaplanová also said that re-gardless of documentation thatInterblue Group would provide,the Environment Ministry hasprepared steps to effectively pro-tect Slovakia’s interests.

Then in a rather bizarre twist,Jana Lütken announced, in a let-ter dated January 21 addressed toEnvironment Minister JozefMedveď, that she had resigned asa board member of Interblue

Group (Europe) due to healthreasons.

According to the text of theletter, which was published bythe Sme daily on its website,Lütken told Medveď that a cameracrew from Slovak broadcaster TVMarkíza had “physicallyhindered” her at the buildingwhere the meeting was held.

“When I was re-entering theSlovak consulate these two menfollowed me and hit my headwith the metal door of the consu-late entrance,” reads the letter.

Lütken claimed that she hadto call for help from her car driverand that several persons had wit-nessed the whole scene, addingthat “such behaviour and physic-al violence might be normal inSlovakia but is unacceptable inSwitzerland”.

Her letter continued that inthe evening she had to go to theemergency room of a hospitalwhere she was diagnosed with a“serious brain concussion” andfor that reason Lütken said thatshe is not permitted to work forseveral weeks and announcedthat she is resigning her positionin Interblue Group (Europe), butperhaps only temporarily.

The editor-in-chief of TVMarkíza, Lukáš Diko, deniedLütken’s accusations and told theSme daily that there was no physical

injury to Lütken caused by thestation’s crew. He also rejected anyattempts to drag the televisionbroadcaster into the disputebetween Interblue and the ministry.

“I think that Lütken and In-terblue are doing everything pos-sible to procrastinate and delaysome concrete steps taken by theSlovak side,” Zuzana Wienk, dir-ector of the Fair-Play Alliance, apolitical watchdog group, toldThe Slovak Spectator. “It seemsabsurd to me that our ministryhas accepted such tactics. MsLütken is not significant at all andthere are enough legal steps thatSlovakia could take regardlesswhether Lütken wants to discussmatters or not.”

According to Wienk, the stateshould be capable of determiningwhether Interblue Group(Europe) is truly the legal suc-cessor of Interblue Group LLCwhich had been registered inWashington State in the US.

“If the Swiss firm is not thelegal successor, the contract forthe sale of emissions is not validand Slovakia should be takingsteps in Washington to collect the€15 million debt through thecourts there and to eventually filea criminal complaint against therepresentatives of the firm for thecrime of damaging the creditor,”Wienk said.

Wienk also said the Envir-onment Ministry should havelong ago turned to a committeewithin the United Nations,which could assess whetherSlovakia met the contract’s con-ditions, to submit a report onthe use of funds from the emis-sions sale.

“If this body confirms thatSlovakia met the conditions, itshould immediately start col-lecting the debt through ex-ecutors and courts from theformer Interblue Group,” saidWienk. “Or if it turns out thatthe Swiss Interblue is the legalsuccessor, then from this firm.The more time that flows by,the feebler are the chances ofSlovakia to collect this money.”

Meanwhile, MP Pavol Frešofrom the Slovak Democratic andChristian Union (SDKÚ) said hewill demand that Medveďprovide an explanation in par-liament about the last meetingwith Lütken.

Slovakia may have lost asmuch as €66 million on thesales price that was negotiatedwith Interblue Group, say op-position parties. The sale hasplayed a part in the sacking oftwo Slovak environment min-isters, Viliam Turský and JánChrbet, both of whom werenominees of the Slovak Na-tional Party.

The Fair-Play Alliance haspublished several documents onits website such as the initialcertificate of formation of In-terblue Group and the first an-nual report filed by the firmwith Washington State author-ities. The latter listed the natureof the business as an “assetholding company”.

The state licensing renewaldated July 6, 2009, names thegoverning people as JanaLütken and Hans Grop, whichaccording to Wienk confirmsthat they were also the ownersof the firm not only its author-ised representatives, as reportedby the SITA newswire.

Jana Lütken faces the media. Photo: TV Markíza

UP: Second pollhalves SaS support

Continued from pg 1

Three more parties, cur-rently sitting in parliamentaryopposition, would again returnto parliament. The ChristianDemocratic Movement (KDH)garnered 8.9 percent supportwhile the poll confirmed a pre-viously recorded fall in supportfor the two primarily ethnic-Hungarian parties, with 6.7percent of those polled support-ing the Hungarian CoalitionParty (SMK) and 6.4 percentbacking the Most-Híd party, es-tablished last year by SMKrenegades.

Junior members of the gov-erning coalition, the Move-ment for a Democratic Slovakia(HZDS) and the Slovak NationalParty (SNS), would also captureseats in the new parliament,polling results of 5.4 and 6 per-cent, respectively.

The director of the MVKagency, Pavel Haulík, said nofirm conclusions can be drawnfrom this single poll and thereis a need for further polls toeither confirm or refute thetrends recorded in January.Political analyst GrigorijMesežnikov agreed withHaulík, saying that a single pollcan sometimes record a devi-ation and that a series of polls isneeded to discern real trends.

Indeed, according to theresults of a telephone surveyconducted by the Polis agencyreleased a few days later, SaShad the support of only 5.5 per-cent of those polled, whileSDKÚ polled much closer to itsrecent level of preferences, atover 15 percent, the Sme dailyreported.

Nevertheless, there are ra-tional explanations for increas-ing voter support for SaS: theparty’s intensive communica-tion via all forms of media, butespecially through electronicmedia and blogs; a series ofpublications released by theleader of SaS; the attention theparty is receiving with its peti-tion for a national referendumon six issues; and its recent re-jection of pre-election coopera-tion with the SDKÚ whichbrought it into the headlines.

“All this could contribute toimproving the position of theparty, but I have a feeling thatthe situation can be adequatelyevaluated only after a certaintime, when the results of otherpolls by other agencies areknown,” Mesežnikov told TheSlovak Spectator.

The Focus agency poll pub-lished on January 28, similarlyto the MVK poll, reported Smeras the clear leader amongparties with over 41 percentsupport of those polled. TheSDKÚ finished second, butwith a considerably higherlevel of support than in theMVK poll, at just over 15 per-cent, followed by the KDH with9 percent. SaS would reach par-liament according to the Focuspoll, but with only slightlyover 5 percent support, aboutthe same as Most-Híd. Otherparties that would meet thethreshold to get parliamentaryseats were the HZDS on 6.5 per-cent, the SNS on 6.2 percentand the SMK on 5.6 percent.

Several sceptical voiceswere raised after MVK pub-lished its poll results, withsome questioning whetherthe poll had been manipulatedin favour of SaS, since betterpolling results tend to encour-age undecided voters to votefor the stronger parties.Haulík rejected such accusa-tions as did the leader of SaS,Richard Sulík.

The Sme daily reported thattwo-thirds of the questions inthe MVK poll were marketingquestions – questions asked onbehalf of clients who pay about€1,200 per question. SaS pur-chased one question in thepoll, asking whether voterswould approve of the party’scurrently-discussed possibilityof a pre-election coalition withMost-Híd. The poll indicatedthat 30 percent of SaS support-ers would not be supportive ofsuch cooperation. SaS appar-ently based its decision not tocooperate with Most-Híd onthe results of that poll.

“Our voters want us to workon our own,” Sulík said, asquoted by the SITA newswire.

Mesežnikov said SaS’s de-cision was rather risky becauseit might have created the im-pression among the public thatSaS decides only on the basis ofpolls, or in this case of only onepoll which may or may not beaccurate.

“They simply evaluated thesituation on the basis of theirfeelings, intuition, knowledgeabout the development of theirelectoral support and the lastpoll and decided not to enter[the cooperation], and the lead-ers of both these parties willbear the consequences of this,either positive or negative,”Mesežnikov said.

3February 1 – 7, 2010NEWS / BUSINESS

PM takes potshot atformer transport minister

ALMOST lost in the barrage of ac-cusations Prime Minister RobertFico has recently launchedagainst the opposition SDKÚparty was a charge that formertransport minister PavolProkopovič had signed a series ofcontracts ceding control of stateland to several business groups inthe last days of his tenure in 2006.Some of the contracts weresigned even after the parliament-ary elections in whichProkopovič’s SDKÚ lost to Fico’sSmer party.

“In the last few days of histenure, he had the gall to signlease contracts that are valid for25 to 50 years and cannot becancelled,” Fico claimed at aJanuary 20 press conference.

The contracts concerneddozens of hectares of land in theDanube River harbours of Bratis-lava and Komárno, as well asnear the Prístavný bridge andrailyards in the Slovak capital.The lands lie in some of thecountry’s most sought-after de-velopment zones.

While not denying that hehad signed the contracts – whichwould have been difficult giventhat Fico distributed copies ofeach to the media – Prokopovičcalled attention to the fact thatthe prime minister was makingthe charges only five monthsahead of parliamentary elections.“It’s clearly an attempt on hispart to draw attention away fromhis own scandals,” said theformer transport minister for TheSlovak Spectator.

Harbour contracts nothing new

While the facts as Ficopresented them are true, they donot tell the whole story. Three ofthe contracts that Prokopovičsigned were with the shippingfirm Dunaj Petrol Trade (DPT) of

Komárno and were extensions ofexisting leases signed in 1998and 2001.

The contracts concern 20 hec-tares (200,000 square metres) ofharbour land in Bratislava andKomárno that DPT intends toturn into transfer stations for fueland other goods. The deals weresigned on April 28 and May 15,2006 and received approval fromProkopovič on May 2 and June 27.Elections took place on June 17,meaning the last approval wassigned as Fico was announcinghis new cabinet.

“All of these unbreakable con-tracts are causing huge problemswith the development of the pub-lic harbours in Komárno andBratislava,” Fico said.

In fact, the contracts relate tothe same plots of land that hadbeen under lease to DPT since2001 (in Bratislava) and 1998(Komárno). These former con-tracts were valid through 2011,but as DPT began the process ofsecuring financing for the trans-fer stations, it found that banksdemanded a longer contractualperiod to ensure there would beno problems in securing a long-term return on the capital.

“The purpose of the new con-tracts, just like the old ones, is tobuild transfer stations for bulkliquid goods,” said DPT bossKamil Szabó in an interviewwith The Slovak Spectator. TheEnvironment Ministry issuedplanning approval for his

company’s project in 2004, withoverall investments estimated at€50 million.

“In other words, these con-tracts were not disadvantageousfor the state, and this project isnot one we came up with at theend of the previous government’stenure,” said Szabó. “These arenot new contracts, but ones thatwe had been working on for sev-eral years before 2006.”

Szabó said he believed thatcurrent Transport MinisterĽubomír Vážny was behind theleaking of the contracts. Vážnyopposes DPT’s proposed devel-opment of the ports. “Immedi-ately after taking office the min-ister wrote a letter protesting theissuance of planning permissionfor our project. In the three yearssince then he has done nothingbut block our efforts, even thoughthese contracts are still valid andthis project was already approvedby the previous government in2001 and again in 2006.”

Without Vážny’s approval,however, DPT has been unable toget planning permission and tobreak ground meaning that ithas been paying about €200,000annually in rent on land it can-not develop. Szabó said he haddecided to stop paying the rent;the contract was legally chal-lenged by the Transport Ministryin 2008, but unsuccessfully.

The day before Fico attackedthe contracts that Prokopovičsigned with DPT, the company

wrote to Vážny that “your refus-al to approve this project is anunjustified and unprecedentedbarrier to free enterprise. Youare causing our company mil-lions in damages.”

Contracts linked to J&T

Fico also attacked two landcontracts approved by the outgo-ing minister in 2006. Both con-tracts were signed with firms re-lated to the J&T financial groupof Bratislava.

Roman Veselka, head of thestate ŽSR railways company,which is under the purview ofthe Transport Ministry, signed astrategic cooperation agreementon July 7 with the Filiálka com-pany, owned by developer J&TReal Estate. Under the agree-ment, ŽSR promised to lease 15hectares of land of ŽSR Bratislava– the Filiálka railyards in sub-urban Bratislava – above a pro-jected underground rail station.J&T wanted to build a shoppingmall and office complex abovethe future metro station.Bratislava’s district 3 had alreadygiven the project its green light.The rent was set at €3 per squaremetre after the project was fin-ished, compared to less than €3before then.

The second “strategic” dealwas inked between theministry’s highways authority,Národná Diaľničná Spoločnosť(NDS), and the Kalos company,which according to the contractwas “linked to the J&T group”.Prokopovič gave his written ap-proval on June 30, two weeksafter he knew he would be leav-ing office.

The deal concerned 1.7 hec-tares of land near the Prístavnýbridge in Bratislava that the NDSowned. The land was to be sold toKalos for almost €200 per squaremetre. According to the land re-gistry office, Kalos did eventu-ally buy the land, but not until2008 and 2009 – in other words,during the tenure of the currenttransport minister.

BY TOM NICHOLSONSpecial to the Spectator

Pavol Prokopovič Photo: SITA

Slovaks honoured for wartime heroismFOURTEEN more people were added to thelist of 500 Slovaks who have been awardedthe title ‘Righteous among the Nations’ onthis year’s Holocaust Remembrance Day.

January 27, the date in 1945 when theAuschwitz concentration and exterminationcamp was liberated, was designated Interna-tional Holocaust Remembrance Day by theUnited Nations. Every year on this day, theState of Israel and the Yad Vashem HolocaustMuseum in Jerusalem award the Righteousamong the Nations title to non-Jewishpeople who risked their life, freedom andsafety in order to rescue one or more Jewsfrom the threat of death or deportationwithout exacting monetary compensation orother rewards.

The Slovaks awarded in memoriam thetitle Righteous among the Nations in 2010were: Vladimír and Jolana Adamík, Jozef andEva Borovský, Tomáš and Alžbeta-MagdaDudášek, Pavel and Anna Krahulec, JozefKurbel, Ján and Mária Porubän, Sister AgátaMatúšková, and Michal and Barbora Zelenay.

Various deeds of help and courage arecontained in the list of names. For instance,the Protestant priest Jozef Borovský, togeth-

er with his wife Eva, helped Jews fromUkraine to get through the Carpathianmountains to Hungary, which was safer forJews than Slovakia at that time. After thewar Borovský was persecuted by the com-munist regime and was even imprisoned andsent to a forced labour camp; he never spokeabout the help he gave Jews for fear of re-prisals by the regime. His relatives onlylearned about his actions after his death, theSITA newswire reported.

Another man, Jozef Korbel, helped hisJewish neighbour build an emergency hid-ing place for his family in the mountainsaround Prievidza in 1944. It was later used bymany families of Jews. He never disclosedthe secret, even during his cruel interroga-tion by an SS commando in which he wastortured, forced him from his home and hishouse burnt down.

The names of those receiving the awardthis year will be added to those of previousrecipients on the Wall of Honour in theGarden of the Righteous in Yad Vashem.People recognised as Righteous among theNations are also awarded a specially mintedmedal bearing their name and a certificate of

honour. The relatives of the 14 Slovaks awar-ded the honour this year accepted them fromthe ambassador of Israel to Slovakia, ZeevBoker, and Israel’s deputy foreign minister,Danny Ayalon.

Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico atten-ded the awards ceremony. In his speech toan audience consisting mainly of relatives ofthe recipients as well as survivors of theHolocaust he stressed the importance of tol-erance and avoiding stereotypes. He alsopointed to what he called the spread of neo-fascism in central Europe, SITA reported.

Ambassador Boker in his speech said heappreciated the Slovak government’s de-cision to build an educational centre andHolocaust museum on the site of a formerlabour camp in Sereď.

Ayalon said the Holocaust was an attackon the human soul and during the Holocaustthere was a danger that the human racewould turn into animals and the worldwould turn into a jungle. He added that thisdid not happen thanks to courageous peoplesuch as those carrying the title of the Right-eous among the Nations, SITA wrote.

Compiled by Spectator staffRichard Sulík and Béla Bugár's will not go into the nationalelections as allies. Photo: TASR

5February 1 – 7, 2010OPINION / NEWS

The Slovak Spectator is an independent newspaper published every Monday by The Rock, s.r.o. Subscriptions: Inquiries should be made to The Slovak Spectator’s business office at (+421-2) 59 233 300. Printing: Petit Press a.s. Distribution: Interpress Slovakia s.r.o., Mediaprint-kapa s.r.o., Slovenská po‰ta a.s. Mail DDistribution: ABOPRESS. Reg. NNo.: 1200/95. © 2008 The Rock, s.r.o. All rights reserved. Any reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited by law. The authors of articles published in this issue, represented by the publisher, reserve the right to give their approval for reproducing and public transmission of articles marked ©The Slovak Spectator, as well as for the public circulation of reproductions of these articles,in compliance with the 33rd article and 1st paragraph of the Copyright Law. Media monitoring is provided by Newton, IT, SMA and Slovakia Online with the approval of the publisher. Advertising material contained herein is the responsibility of the advertiser and is not a written or implied sponsorship, endorsement or investigation of suchcommercial enterprises or ventures by The Slovak Spectator or The Rock s.r.o. ISSN 1335-9843.Address: The Rock, s.r.o., Lazaretská 12, 811 08 Bratislava

JÁN PALLO - Publisher

EDITORIALBEATA BALOGOVÁ - Editor - In - Chief JAMES THOMSON - Assistant EditorDONALD SPATZ - Assistant EditorJANA LIPTÁKOVÁ - Staff Writer

MICHAELA STANKOVÁ - Staff WriterDOMINIKA UHRÍKOVÁ - Staff Writer

ZUZANA VILIKOVSKÁ - News Researcher

LAYOUT, WEB & IT TATIANA ·TRAUCHOVÁ - Graphic Designer

ROMAN KRÁª - ITTOMÁ· PALLO - Online Publishing

SALES - FINANCESBEATA FOJTÍKOVÁ - Sales Executive

MARTINA ·MATLÁKOVÁ - PR and Marketing ManagerMARTA FUKASOVÁ - Advertising AssistantDÁ·A REHÁKOVÁ - Circulation Manager

Sniffing the foul air of prejudiceTHE DWINDLING of prejudices,stereotypes and tensionsbetween minorities and the ma-jority population should besigns of a nation’s society com-ing of age, say the philosophersamong us when making theircontributions to post-moderndiscourse. Over the past coupleof years, however, it seems thatsome nations are relapsing intochildhood rather than advan-cing toward maturity in erasingprejudices, reducing conflictsbetween groups of citizens, andscouring racism, sexism andhomophobia from society.

If one of the signs of thegreatness of a nation is howwell its majority populationbehaves towards its minorities,there would not be many ‘great’nations in central Europe rightnow, especially when lookingat it from the perspective ofRoma citizens.

Many surveys have con-firmed that ethnic prejudice hasbeen worsening in the regionand that ‘majority citizens’squeezed by the global economicdownturn have too often re-sponded to their economic in-security with more hostility to-wards Roma communities.

The European Union Agencyfor Fundamental Rights in aDecember 2009 release wrotethat over the past 12 months asmany as 64 percent of CzechRoma were victims of discrimin-ation. In Hungary that numberstood at 62 percent. And accord-ing to the report, an overwhelm-ing majority of those surveyedhad not reported their discrim-ination to any organisation,which means that thousandsmore incidents of discriminatorytreatment might be invisible.

On January 26, Amnesty In-ternational lashed out at Ro-manian authorities for thatcountry’s inhumane treatmentof its Roma minority and calledon officials to cease forciblyevicting Roma families and toimmediately “relocate thoseliving for years in hazardousconditions next to wastedumps, sewage treatmentplants or industrial areas on theoutskirts of cities”.

And Slovakia? Slovaks re-gard ethnic tensions as more

dominant than any other kind ofsocial conflict, according to a re-cent report prepared by theSlovak Academy of Sciences. Thesharpest social tension existsbetween Roma and non-Romacitizens, with Slovak-Hungari-an tensions coming right be-hind, the Academy’s Interna-tional Social Survey Programme2009-2010 found.

The report said 25 percent ofthose polled consider tensionbetween Roma and non-Roma tobe very sharp, while 50 percentsaid they perceive it as sharp.Sociologists involved with thesurvey also stated that Roma cit-izens are now starting to be evenmore discontented with theirunequal status in society.

Over the past year, therehave been reports about townstoying with the idea of buildingwalls to separate non-Romaand Roma residents and the vil-lage of Ostrovany actually erec-ted such a wall. Extremistgroups have organised massmarches in several townswhile local residents com-plained via the media aboutrising tensions between non-Roma and Roma in their com-munities.

It is at this point that one ofthe ruling coalition parties, the

Slovak National Party, haschosen to trot out its old‘solutions’ for its version of the‘Roma problem’ and begun todisseminate so-called reportspacked with hackneyed stereo-types of Roma via its party web-television. SNS’s ‘reporter’ callsRoma citizens ‘gypsies’ while itsdeputy chairwoman, Anna Be-lousovova, promptly rational-ises that this is because “SNS isnot hypocritical and always callsproblems by their right name,”as quoted by the Sme daily.

With parliamentary elec-tions nearing it is quite likelythat the SNS will keep dirtyingthe already grimy political dis-course with its well-worn ideas.Belousovova has already sug-gested that regular publicationof crime statistics involvingRoma should be resumed.

After some of our politi-cians sniffed the foul air anddecided that ‘doing somethingabout Roma’ is once again safeand sellable because of in-creasing tensions within sometowns with a large number ofRoma residents, severalparties have suddenly declaredthat this issue will now bespotlighted on their agendas.But if society and the mediawant to find a comprehensiveand sustainable policy for bet-ter social inclusion of Romacitizens, the search must startwith the third, non-govern-mental sector becauseSlovakia’s government officesand political parties are bereftof sensible ideas.

The nearing elections arelikely to produce a whole bat-talion of politicians who havebecome home-grown sociolo-gists, ethnographers, or expertson minorities and cultural is-sues. Weirdly enough, many ofour politicians think thatsimply because they joined apolitical party and were thenelected to their seats or party of-fices, they also somehow in-haled sufficient wisdom toknow what is best for minoritygroups. And so often – just forthe sake of a snappy statement,one they think might resonatewell with voters – these char-latans risk inciting even moretension in society.

BY BEATA BALOGOVÁSpectator staff

QUOTE OF THE WEEK:

To be continued

THE TOP Slovak phrase of thisweek needs no translation, be-cause it’s already in English. “Tobe continued”, said Prime Min-ister Fico as he was approachingthe end of his press conference,where he provided evidence ofshady financing of the opposi-tion SDKÚ party, and warnedthe party of former prime min-ister Mikuláš Dzurinda thatmore damaging revelations areto come.

It’s not as though Dzurindahasn’t had enough. Swiss ac-counts, Caribbean tax havens,and foreign firms with names like“Allied Wings”: all of it soundslike something you would nor-mally deal with if you were run-ning a mafia organisation, not apolitical party. It will probably bedifficult to explain to voters in theupcoming election campaign notonly where the SDKÚ gets itsmoney, but even the more simplestuff, such as why the party logo

belongs to a limited liability com-pany owned by a London-basedfirm. But apparently, Dzurinda’snot in a talkative mood.

The affair is just a sequel,whose first part came in 2005,when the media initially repor-ted on the sale of the SDKÚ’sbuilding. Then, as now, theparty refused to provide anyspecifics on the mysteries of itsaccounting. Dzurinda’s decisionto not answer any questions,and just file unspecified crimin-

al charges against Fico, in thehope that people will just shrugtheir shoulders and move on, isridiculous.

The entire situation has twodire consequences. The first isthat in this crucial, pre-electionperiod, Fico has managed to shiftpublic attention from the manyscandals of his own government.In the last three and a half years,Slovakia has seen a tender worthmillions of euros announced onthe bulletin board of a locked min-istry hallway, the sale of emissionquotas to a mysterious US garagefirm for half the market price, anda toll-system tender won by farthe highest bid. Much of that willnow be forgotten.

And even those who will notforget will find it hard to find analternative. Sure, there are otheropposition parties, but the SDKÚhas long been their leader, so itsscandals tarnish the opposition asa whole. And that is the secondmain result of the SDKÚ scandal –a morally and politicallyweakened opposition. All of thatmakes the Fico government muchmore likely to be continued.

SLOVAK WORDOF THE WEEK

EDITORIAL

BY LUKÁŠ FILASpecial to the Spectator

"How can we talk about a democratic political system if sucha suspicious political party aspires to power in the state?"

Prime Minister Robert Fico, referring to accusations he has made about the opposition SDKÚ party

SNP: Ministers decried as 'scoundrels'Continued from pg 2

Political rivals Pál Csáky, the leader of theHungarian Coalition Party (SMK) and Béla Bugár,the chairman of Most-Híd, a party founded inspring 2009 by breakaway SMK renegades, stoodon the stage together.

“I think this is a clear signal that Slovakiawants a change,” said Csáky as he addressed thecrowd.

“It’s time to say that the emperor is naked, thatthe people have been deceived,” Bugár said.

The leader of the Freedom and Solidarity (SaS)party, Richard Sulík, said his party joined theprotest against the present government also withits petition calling for a referendum on multiple is-sues, one of which is the cancellation of mandat-ory fees for Slovakia’s public-service radio and TV.

The leader of the OKS, Peter Zajac, said thatSlovakia needs educated people, because with

more educated people active in public life, the lesschance there will be of getting “scoundrels such asthose who rule us today”.

Mesežnikov said that the strong criticism andrejection of the current government represented asignificant message flowing from the protest.

“After such a manifestation it will be a bigproblem [for an opposition party] to consider anycooperation with the ruling parties, to justify co-operation with them,” he said, adding that thissignal to the voters could have an impact on theirattitudes towards the opposition parties.

“I perceive it as them drawing a clear distinc-tion [between themselves] and the government ofthe ruling coalition,” Mesežnikov said in his ana-lysis of the protest. “They are competing amongthemselves for similar groups of voters, that’strue, but [through the protest] they are showingthat they are ready to cooperate and they see thegovernment as their main enemy.”

SUBSCRIPTION FORM

Name/Company: ____________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________

Address: ________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Post code: _________________ City: _______________________ Country: _______________________________________________

Tel.: _______________________ Fax: ________________________ E-mail: ________________________________________________

�

For more information visit www.spectator.sk/productsSend your order form to: The Rock s.r.o., Circulation Department, Lazaretská 12, 811 08 Bratislava, Slovak Republic, Save time - call: +421 2 59 233 300, fax: +421 2 59 233 319, e-mail: circulation@spectator.sk, or spectator@spectator.sk

❑ Bank ❑ Postal Order❑ Credit Card ❑ Personal Check

No. _____________ Card expiry date: ____________

Signature ________________ Date: _______________

Slovakia € Czech Poland OOther OOther USA, CCanadarep. rep. Europe Countries Australia

Half year* € 28 (Sk 8843.53)❑ € 55 ❑ € 55 ❑ € 65 ❑ € 80 ❑ $100 ❑One year* € 52 (Sk 11566.55)❑ € 95 ❑ € 95 ❑ €125 ❑ €150 ❑ $190 ❑Two years* € 98 (Sk 22952.35)❑ €180❑ €180 ❑ €245 ❑ €285 ❑ $360 ❑

€ 1 = Sk 330.1260 * prices include VAT and postage

All subscribers receive our special publications - Spectacular SSlovakia TTravel GGuide, BBook oof LLists, CCareer GGuide, RReal EEstate GGuide, aand IInvestment AAdvisory GGuide

- for free. throughout the year. Now you will also receive the magazine SSPEX and FREE AACCESS to our website www.spectator.sk with your subscription.

Industrial parks in Žilina Region

Industrial parks (Priemyselný park - PP) in hectares (ha):-PP Bytča – total area 7.67 ha (of which 5.75 ha are available)-PP Martin-Sučany – total area of 436 ha-PP KIA, located in Teplička nad Váhom, Gbeľany and Nededza –total area 424 ha-PP Strečno – total area 60 ha (of which 8 ha are available)-PP Oravská Jasenica – total area 10 ha (of which 10 ha areavailable)-PP Varín – total area 16.6 ha-PP CTP Dolný Hričov – total area 36 ha-PP Horný Hričov – total area 10.8 ha-PP CTP Martin – total area 30 ha-PP Gbeľany – total area 30 ha-PP Punch Námestovo – total area 8 ha

Source: SARIO

Some of the companies andinvestors in Žilina Region

ECCO Shoes Slovakia, Martin, www.ecco.com- Footwear producer

Ferona Slovakia, Žilina, www.ferona.sk- The top seller of metallurgical products in Slovakia

INA Kysuce, Kysucké Nové Mesto, www.schaeffler.sk- Producer of bearings of all types

Kia Motors Slovakia, Žilina, www.kia.sk- One of the three major car manufacturers in Slovakia

Metsä Tissue, Žilina, www.metsatissue.com- A leading paper tissue supplier to households and large-scaleconsumers in Europe

Mobis Slovakia, Gbeľany, www.mobis.co.kr- Automotive components manufacturer

Mondi SCP, Ružomberok, www.mondigroup.com- Paper producer and member of Mondi Group

OFZ, Istebné, www.ofz.sk- The largest central European manufacturer of ferroalloys

Panasonic Electronic Devices Slovakia, Trstená,www.pedeu.panasonic.sk- Producer of electronic devices with two production units,in Trstená and Stará Ľubovňa

Stredoslovenská Energetika, Žilina, www.sse.sk- Regional electricity distributor with over 690,000 customersin Žilina, Trenčín and Banská Bystrica Regions

TFC Cable Assemblies, Námestovo, www.tfcasm.co.uk- Electronics manufacturer producing custom cableassemblies, cable harnesses, wiring harnesses, etc.

Váhostav-SK, Žilina, www.vahostav-sk.sk- One of Slovakia’s biggest construction companies

Volkswagen Slovakia, Martin, www.volkswagen.sk- The plant produces components for gearboxes, axles andsteering systems

Source: SARIO, The Slovak Spectator database

Žilina Region institutions

Žilina Self-Governing Region (Žilinský samosprávny kraj - ŽSK)www.regionzilina.sk

President of Žilina Self-Governing Region: Juraj Blanár

6 February 1 – 7, 2010

Žilina Region targets EUfunds for development

BEING RE-ELECTED as the pres-ident of the Žilina Self-GoverningRegion enables Juraj Blanár tocontinue the regional develop-ment activities he had started inhis previous term. The economiccrisis and its impacts have notavoided Žilina Region eitherwhile he sees massive spendingof EU funds as a way to combat itsimpacts over the region. TheSlovak Spectator spoke to Blanárabout his plans, most urgent is-sues of the region and solutionshe proposes.

The Slovak Spectator (TSS): InNovember 2009 you were re-elected as the president of theŽilina Self-Governing Region.What are your main plans forthe next four years?

Juraj Blanár (JB): I am gladthat we can continue the activit-ies already launched which willthus benefit from continuity andwill help improve and enhancethe quality of life in the individu-al parts of our region. My greatpriority is to continue develop-ing our four hospitals and poly-clinics. We also have to cope witha modernisation real estate debt,got in the property by the self-governing region, related to thearea of health care, social affairs,education, transport and culture.We will continue supporting so-cial services available to the gen-eral public, and our goal is to ex-tend capacities for placing of aid-dependent people in any of thefacilities under our office.

Another of our priorities isdrawing of European Unionfunds. The new EU budgetaryperiod offers huge opportunit-ies for development of our re-gion. So far the Žilina Self-Gov-erning Region has been success-ful, especially in drawing of EUfunds for the modernisation ofhospitals and the reconstruc-tion of roads. In the future weplan to use this source of fund-ing as extensively as possiblefor the enhancement of social,

educational, and cultural facil-ities in our region.

TSS: What are the most urgentproblems of the Žilina Self-Governing Region? What solu-tions do you propose?

JB: We have experienced theeffects of the economic crisis inthe form of lower income taxrevenue, which has meant thatthe budget for 2010 does not cov-er all the investments that wewould like to carry out. But

money-saving must not affectthe quality of services providedin health care or the socialsphere, being important and ir-replaceable ones for people.

In the context of the econom-ic crisis and the drop in the num-ber of visitors in the region, wewant to focus more on promotionof the beauties of our sub-regionsto attract more visitors. What isimportant is quality marketingsupport, which we are seeking toprovide at tourism fairs and bymanaging info-tours for foreigntour operators. I believe that alsolighting and restoration of ourhistorical jewels – the castles ofOrava, Strečno and Budatín, all ofwhich have received new light-ing recently – will contribute toan increasing interest in our re-gion among visitors.

TSS: What impact has the eco-nomic crisis had on Žilina Re-gion and the functioning of theoffice of the Žilina Self-Govern-ing Region? What measures doyou propose or have youalready implemented to softenthe impact of the crisis?

JB: The primary goal is to en-sure a problem-free functioningof all 126 organisations operatingin the founding scope of theŽilina Self-Governing Region, aswell as their personnel stability.The Žilina Self-Governing RegionOffice will meet all its responsib-ilities in order that the publicdoes not experience the effects ofinternal measures aimed at sav-ing and greater efficiency. Meas-ures to combat the crisis I seeparticularly in a massive spend-ing of the EU funds.

See JB pg 8

Juraj Blanár, president of the Žilina Self-Governing RegionPhoto: Courtesy of Žilina Self-Governing Region

BY JANA LIPTÁKOVÁSpectator staff

BUSINESS FOCUS

CENTRAL SLOVAKIA EASTERN SLOVAKIA

Nature, history and otherattractions

Local businesses alsodeserve support

Žilina Region moves aheaddespite economic crunch

ŽILINA Region has successfully recoveredfrom the collapse of its traditional arma-ments industry and has recently drawn hugeinvestments particularly from the automot-ive industry. But the region’s strong connec-tion to car production and its related sectorshas shown itself to be not entirely favourableduring the current economic crisis and hashighlighted the need for more economic di-versification.

Business officials in the region see in-formation-communication technologies andtransport as important prospective econom-ic sectors. Attracting more tourists through

recently established tourism clusters is an-other promising step toward such diversific-

ation. The incomplete highway systemcrossing the region remains a sore pointamong local businesses.

“The biggest impulse for revitalisationand economic growth in Žilina Region,after the breakdown of the armaments in-dustry in late 1990s, was brought by theswiftly developing engineering, eletro-technical and automotive industries,”Timea Nemešová, the project manager ofthe direct foreign investments section atthe Slovak Investment and Trade Devel-opment Agency (SARIO) told The SlovakSpectator. “The investment of Kia Motorsfrom Korea, along with its dense networkof subcontractors, has become a propellingengine for growth in the whole region.”

Kia Motors arrived in Slovakia in 2004and constructed a brand-new plant for as-sembly of cars and production of engines inTeplička nad Váhom, close to Žilina. Itlaunched serial car production in Decem-ber 2006.

See AUTO pg 9

Autos reign supremebut more diversification

is sought

A new Hyundai model being produced at theKia Motors Slovakia plant. Photo: Reuters

BY JANA LIPTÁKOVÁSpectator staff

Žilina Region general facts

Capital: ŽilinaTotal area: 6,808.7 square kilometresPopulation: 696,347 inhabitants (as of December 31, 2008)Unemployment rate: 10.89 percent (as of December 31,2009)

Source: The Slovak Statistics Office;

National Labour, Social Affairs and Family Office

Overcoming inter-regionaldisparities is a priority

BANSKÁ Bystrica Region is themost rural region in Slovakia andeven though its labour forceranks as the second best-edu-cated among Slovakia’s eight re-gions, this central part of thecountry is seeking to overcomelong-term inter-regional dispar-ities. New, innovative policiesand differentiated support to dis-tricts are ways of reducing thedisparities according to VladimírMaňka, the newly-elected pres-ident of the Banská Bystrica Self-Governing Region. The SlovakSpectator spoke to Maňka abouthis plans as president, the mostpressing problems of the regionand his ideas for solutions.

The Slovak Spectator (TSS): InNovember 2009 you were elec-ted as the president of theBanská Bystrica Self-Govern-ing Region. What are your mainplans for the next four years?

Vladimír Maňka (VM): Actu-ally I have been in the post onlysince January of this year. In myfirst steps I am analysing the cur-rent condition of the budget andproblems in the Banská BystricaSelf-Governing Region, the con-dition of organisations and facil-ities under the auspices of our of-fice, and the situation in drawingfunds from the European Union.The budget, by far, does notmatch the basic needs of our pro-grammes and facilities and this isnot only because of the financialand economic crisis.

My priorities lay in twolevels. The first is to keep the

activities we administer func-tional, to stabilise the budget, todevelop the quality of servicesprovided by our organisationsand facilities and to make themmore effective and to finance thisfrom sources other than ourbudget, especially through theuse of EU funds.

The second priority is to bal-ance deep inter-regional dispar-ities, to increase employmentand the quality of life of peopleliving in this region. To accom-

plish this we need to better tapthe potential of our region.

TSS: What are the most urgentproblems of Banská BystricaRegion? What solutions do youpropose?

VM: Our region tops rankingsof unemployment and risk ofpoverty. EU funds will help usreduce unemployment, increaseeconomic growth and improvelabour productivity. New in-vestors who will create sustain-

able workplaces can help the re-gion. We have to make better useof the strong points of BanskáBystrica Region, which includerich sources of drinking water aswell as mineral and healing wa-ters, excellent conditions fortourism, known sources of geo-thermal energy, and renewableenergy. The labour force in ourregion is the second best-edu-cated in Slovakia. We also haveappropriate institutions for sci-ence, research and innovationand available labour, especiallyin the countryside.

When I served as the mayorof Zvolen, the city actively co-operated with universities –which helped us to use local po-tential and climb to the top of theranking of all Slovak towns inharnessing available sources ofrenewable energy.

TSS: What influence has theeconomic crisis had on BanskáBystrica Region and the officeof the Banská Bystrica Self-Governing Region? Whatmeasures do you propose orhave you already implementedto soften the impact of thecrisis?VM: The economic crisis has sig-nificantly slowed down devel-opment of the region andworsened the situation in lag-ging districts. The unemploy-ment rate in the districts ofRimavská Sobota and Revúca ex-ceeded 30 percent at the end of2009 and was the highest amongall 79 districts of Slovakia.

Banská Bystrica Region suf-fers from serious structural prob-lems and huge inter-regionaldisparities.

See MAŇKA pg 11

7February 1 – 7, 2010BUSINESS FOCUS

Vladimír Maňka, president of the Banská Bystrica Self-GoverningRegion Photo: Courtesy of BBSK

Searching for a brighter future

BANSKÁ Bystrica Region is one of the leastdeveloped regions of Slovakia. This is partlydue to a heavy burden from the past when thecollapse of markets in the Eastern Bloc causedlarge companies in the region to abruptlyshut down. More recently, the insufficientlydeveloped highway infrastructure has be-come a sore point with regional officials, whosay it discourages foreign investors from loc-ating within the region.

In response to a changed domestic andglobal economic situation in which theregion’s traditional raw materials have be-come less important for its future develop-ment, local governments and businesses arefocusing on business innovations, researchand development, information technology, bi-otechnology, and last but not least, tourism asthe harbingers of a brighter economic future.

“The production sector of Banská BystricaRegion, compared with Slovakia’s other re-gions, has its specific features, especially dueto considerable differences among our indi-vidual districts' economic bases andinfrastructure,” Ľubomíra Slobodová, the

director of the Banská Bystrica regionalchamber of the Slovak Chamber of Commerceand Industry (BBRK SOPK), told The SlovakSpectator. “The northern part of the region isquite highly industrialised. Engineering, me-tallurgy, wood processing and papermaking,chemicals, pharmaceuticals, constructionand tourism are the main economic segmentsand have the best prospects for further devel-opment. The southern part of the region has abase in food production and other segmentscomplementary to agriculture.”

Emília Kodríková from the office of theBanská Bystrica Self-Governing Region saysthese geographical differences are historical,with industry traditionally strong in thenorth and agriculture and food dominating inthe south.

“The fall of the previous, communist re-gime and the collapse of markets in the so-

called Eastern Bloc resulted in the closure oflarge local companies, leaving thousands ofpeople jobless,” Kodríková told The SlovakSpectator. “After 1990 the state also ceasedsupporting inefficient production, mostly inagriculture, which had given employmentto a marginalised and inadaptable labourforce with only basic education, the major-ity of whom lived in the south-eastern partof Banská Bystrica Region.”

These factors pushed the region into thecurrent position of being one of the least de-veloped of Slovakia’s eight regions.

“The region is reporting the highest un-employment rate in Slovakia, with it climb-ing to 19.19 percent at the end of 2009 com-pared with the national average of 12.66percent,” said Kodríková. “In districts whichused to focus on agriculture and food pro-duction, the jobless rate is even higher, ran-ging between 22 percent and 33 percent. Theregion’s share of sales of industrial produc-tion is decreasing; presently it accounts foronly 5 percent of the country’s total indus-trial production.”

Insufficient road infrastructure is an-other key factor influencing the currenteconomic situation of the region.

“Because of unsuitable road infrastruc-ture, only very few foreign investors havedecided to locate their investment inBanská Bystrica Region,” said VladimírBrieda from the Banská Bystrica Self-Gov-erning Region.

See BB pg 8

Banská Bystrica Regionlooks beyond its

traditional economic base

BY JANA LIPTÁKOVÁSpectator staff

Highway construction could help. Photo: Sme

Banská Bystrica Region general facts

Capital: Banská BystricaTotal area: 9,454.7 square kilometresPopulation: 653,697 inhabitants (as of December 31, 2008)Unemployment rate: 19.19 percent (as of December 31, 2009)

Source: The Slovak Statistics Office; National Labour, Social Affairs and

Family Office

Banská Bystrica Region institutions

Banská Bystrica Self-Governing Region (Bansko-Bystrickýsamosprávny kraj - BBSK)www.vucbb.sk

President of Banská Bystrica Self-Governing Region:Vladimír Maňka

Some of the companies and investorsin Banská Bystrica Region

Biotika, Slovenská Ľupča, www.biotika.sk- Pharmaceutical producer

Bučina DDD, Zvolen, www.bucina-ddd.sk- One of the largest producers of particleboard in Slovakia

Fermas, Slovenská Ľupča, www.fermas.sk- Feed producer

Lesy SR, Banská Bystrica, www.lesy.sk- A state-owned company administering forests and related stateproperty

SHP Harmanec, Harmanec, www.shpgroup.eu- Producer of a wide range of sanitary paper products

Slovalco, Žiar nad Hronom, www.slovalco.sk- Aluminium smelter

Slovenská Pošta, Banská Bystrica, www.posta.sk- National postal service

Slovenské Magnezitové Závody, Jelšava, www.smzjelsava.sk- Mining and magnesite manufacturing plant

Smrečina Hofatex, Banská Bystrica, www.hofatex.eu- Manufacturer of wood-fibre insulation materials

Tauris, Rimavská Sobota, www.tauris.sk- Producer of meat and meat products

Tlačiarne BB, Banská Bystrica, www.tbb.sk- Printing house

ZSNP, Žiar nad Hronom, www.zsnp.sk- Metallurgical company focusing on aluminium processing

Železiarne Podbrezová, Podbrezová, www.zelpo.sk- One of the oldest metallurgical companies in central Europe,making steel blooms, seamless tubes, etc.

Source: SARIO, The Slovak Spectator database

Industrial parksin Banská Bystrica Region

Industrial parks (Priemyselný park - PP) in hectares (ha):-PP Majer-Šalková, Banská Bystrica – total area 35.7 ha (of which8 ha are available)-PP Brezno Rohozná – total area 55 ha-PP Detva-Trstená – total area 12 ha-PP Park Detva – premises of PPS – total area 29 ha (of which 16 haare available)-PP Park Vígľaš-Pod Bachtárom – total area 37.8 ha-PP Krupina Juh – total area 26.6 ha (of which 5.5 ha areavailable)-PP Tomášovce – total area 30 ha (of which 20 ha are available)-PP Lučenec Juh – total area 70.8 ha-PP Poltár Jelšoviny – total area 24.5 ha-PP Rimavská Sobota Sever – total area 12 ha (of which 12 ha areavailable)-PP Gemer – total area 7.1 ha-PP Malý Krtíš – total area 22 ha (of which 0.2 ha are available)-PP Hliník nad Hronom – total area 25 ha (of which 23 ha areavailable)-PP Pod Lipou in Žarnovica – total area 18 ha-PP ZSNP in Žiar nad Hronom – total area 335 ha (of which 10 haare available)-PP Hnúšťa – total area 44 ha (of which 38 ha are available)-PP Kriváň – total area 30 ha (of which 11 ha are available)-PP Nová Baňa – total area 22 ha (of which 21 ha are available)-PP Tornaľa – total area 19.8 ha (of which 5.5 ha are available)

Source: SARIO

BY JANA LIPTÁKOVÁSpectator staff

8 February 1 – 7, 2010 BUSINESS FOCUS

Nature, history and other attractions

SLOVAKIA is sometimes dubbedthe tourist destination witheverything but the sea. It hasbeautiful flora and fauna, moun-tains and lakes, as well as histor-ical and modern sites and is suit-able for both summer as well aswinter tourism. The regions ofBanská Bystrica and Žilina are noexception, offering a wholerange of visitor attractions.

The regions, which are bothpredominantly mountainous,boast sites inscribed on theUNESCO World Heritage List.Hidden in the Štiavnické Vrchy(Štiavnica Hills) is the historictown of Banská Štiavnica,which along with the technicalmonuments in its vicinity hasbeen on the list since 1993. Vis-itors to this place can breathe inits history as a great miningtown with almost every stepthey take. The hills all aroundare riddled with thousands ofkilometres of mines, while al-most every one of the locallakes is man-made. Theselakes, known as ‘tajchy’ anddating back mostly to the 18thcentury, were part of the in-genious water managementsystem whose purpose was to

accumulate water mass to beused as an energy sourcepowering numerous miningmachines and facilities.

Banská Štiavnica wasformerly one of the most signi-ficant centres for preciousmetals mining, as well as forthe study of mining science,technology and education, inall Europe. The world's firsttechnical university, whichwas devoted to mining, miner-alogy, physics and chemistry,was established here in around

1770 by a decree of the AustrianEmpress Maria Theresa; it in-spired the subsequent estab-lishment of the École Polytech-nique in Paris. The town nowboasts renaissance palaces,16th-century churches, elegantsquares and castles.

Those interested in the his-tory of mining can visit theOpen-Air Mining Museum,which provides an overview ofthe history of mining in the re-gion as well as the whole ofSlovakia.

In Žilina Region, tourists canvisit Vlkolínec, a small villagelocated in the Veľká Fatra na-tional park. This is a typicalSlovak mountain village whosealmost perfectly-preserved his-torical wooden architecture putit on the UNESCO list in 1993.

Those interested in folk archi-tecture can also go to the villageof Čičmany, known for its dis-tinctively decorated wooden ar-chitecture, as well as the open-airmuseums in Martin, Pribylina,Nová Bystrica, and Zuberec.

Three of the eight woodenchurches of the Slovak part ofthe Carpathian Mountain Areathat were added to the UNESCOlist in 2008 are located in centralSlovakia: the Catholic church inTvrdošín, and the Evangelicalchurches in Leštiny, near DolnýKubín, and Hronsek, close toZvolen.

Among historical sites themost popular are Orava andStrečno castles, while the east-ern part of Banská Bystrica Re-gion offers a number of Gothicgems along the southern part ofSlovakia’s Gothic Route. Theseinclude, for example, the an-cient church in Kraskovo whichwas built at the end of the 13thcentury in the early Gothic styleand which also featuresRomanesque elements. Its re-markably abundant and com-plex decorative paintings were

made by two workshopsbetween 1360 and 1380.

In winter, the mountains ofthe Low and Western Tatras, andMalá and Veľká Fatra offer anumber of ski resorts, of whichseveral are among Slovakia’s topcentres, for example Jasná andPark Snow Donovaly, both in theLow Tatras, Martinské Hole abovethe historic town of Martin, SkiPark Ružomberok, Vrátna FreeTime Zone and Park Snow VeľkáRača. In summer, tourists can gohiking in the same mountains.Among other summer destina-tions, the most popular are theManínska and KostoleckáTiesňava gorges. Those lookingfor natural stone creations shouldalso head to the Súľovské Skalymountains or visit the old stonequarry at Milošová-Megoňky,close to Čadca. Here they will findunique spherical stones. And on ahill above the village of Vyhne isSlovakia's biggest 'stone sea', adramatic cascade of looseboulders. Central Slovakia is alsohome to the highest and best-pre-served volcano in the country –Poľana. It is among the Europe’sbiggest extinct volcanoes.

To fully tap the potential oftourism, different bodies doingbusiness in this sphere havecreated destination manage-ment organisations, known asklasters in Slovakia (equivalentto 'clusters' in English). The

Liptov Klaster was the first onesuccessfully to link the powersof firms and individuals as wellas local public administrationbodies to increase their chancesof success. The Orava and Turiecklasters followed shortly there-after. Their primary goal is topursue joint marketing andthereby boost the image of theirregion and spread informationabout its sights and natural at-tractions, as well as about theservices on offer. Anothercluster, Balnea Cluster Dudince,was created in Dudince, nearthe western border of BanskáBystrica Region, in June 2008 asthe first spa cluster in Slovakia.

Dudince is not the only spain central Slovakia. Others fam-ous spas can be found in Sliač,Turčianske Teplice, SklenenéTeplice, Rajecké Teplice, Lúčky,Brusno and Číž, providing cur-ative therapies for an extensiverange of diseases as well aswellness stays. Water loverscan also enjoy the attractions atMeander Park, a thermalaquapark in Oravice, andThermal Park Bešeňová.

There is very much more tosee in central Slovakia. One onlyhas to keep one’s eyes open andnot be afraid to visit the lesserknown places, which, forgottenby history, often hide real jew-els which cannot be found any-where else.

BB: Local businesses also deserve supportContinued from pg 7

Completion of a dual-carriageway roadjoining Nitra and Banská Bystrica may im-prove the situation. The Granvia consorti-um is building 52 kilometres of dual-car-riage highway over the next three years aspart of a public-private partnership project.

Slobodová agrees that the absence ofquality transport infrastructure intercon-necting the region with European transportcorridors has curbed economic developmentwithin Banská Bystrica Region.

“Thus, the completion of the four-lanedual-carriageway road on the entire stretchbetween Nitra and Banská Bystrica is mostimportant from the viewpoint of prospectsfor development of business,” saidSlobodová, adding that after its construc-tion, usage of the airport in Sliač could alsobe more dynamic.

When listing other hindrances to for-eign investors, Slobodová also mentionedinsufficiently prepared technical infra-structure for industrial parks or industrialzones in most of the region’s towns, an ab-sence of consultancy centres and special-ised research and development centresconnected with the manufacturing sphere,and a labour force with a shortage of quali-fications fitting the needs of local busi-nesses.

Brieda added a few additional obstacleswhich he said are impeding economic de-velopment: the fact that the regional gov-ernment does not have direct investmentstimuli at its disposal, for example the cap-ability to reduce or forgive taxes or to grant afinancial subsidy; the poor condition of localrailways; and airport at Sliač not being onthe list of Schengen-zone airports.

“Support for economic development ofthe region on the part of the Banská BystricaSelf-Governing Region's office focuses espe-cially on activities which support the devel-opment of doing business and innovations,”said Brieda. “These especially include pre-paration and elaboration of strategic plan-ning documents, creation of partnershipsand securing flows of information between

the business sphere, supportive educationalinstitutions and local administration.”

The Slovak Investment and Trade Devel-opment Agency (SARIO), with the main taskof drawing foreign investors to Slovakia, co-operates with the regional self-governmentas well as the regional chamber of SOPK tosupport an inflow of foreign investments intothe region.

“Between 2002 and 2008 SARIO success-fully carried out 29 investment projects with aplanned investment volume of €684.75 mil-lion and the prospect of creating between5,889 and 8,186 jobs in Banská BystricaRegion,” Timea Nemešová, the project man-ager of the foreign direct investment sectionat SARIO told The Slovak Spectator. “Of thisamount, the largest investment share, 28 per-cent, was directed into the construction andwood-processing industries.” These includedinvestments by Divani Recliner, RettenmeierHolding AG, and Knauf Insulation.

She said investment in the engineeringand metal processing industry accounted for24 percent and included Tubex Holding, Wit-tur, and Sisme Slovakia; investments ac-counting for 21 percent of the total flowed tothe chemical industry and involved Trelle-borg AB and Fermas-Degussa; and that auto-motive industry investment was only 7 per-cent of the total, coming from Johnson Con-trols and Sewon ECS.

Total foreign direct investments (FDI) inthe region amounted to €0.5 billion at the endof 2007, Slobodová said, citing figures of theNational Bank of Slovakia. Banská BystricaRegion accounted for only 1.9 percent ofSlovakia’s aggregate FDI. This share was 0.7percentage points lower than in 2006 andranked the region in the second lowest posi-tion of all eight regions.

But Slobodová believes that not all thesupport for economic development should fo-cus on foreign investments.

“Foreign investments are crucial for Slov-akia but they should be not supported to thedetriment of the local business sphere,”Slobodová said. “State assistance is orientedon large foreign investors and often has con-tributed to the deepening of regional disparit-

ies. Local companies are forced to financetheir development activities only from theirown resources.”

To support her point, Slobodová high-lighted the creation of a large industrial parkin the premises of the former VlkanovskéStrojárne engineering company in Vlkanová.The industrial park now houses 12 companiesemploying roughly 1,000 people.

While the presence of local raw materialswere decisive when creating regional devel-opment strategies in the past, during thisperiod of globalisation, characterised by asharp rise in information technologies, theimportance of raw material resources hasbeen decreasing.

“It is necessary to focus on products meet-ing the needs of the current time,” saidSlobodová. “From this point of view, our re-gion must orient itself towards IT, biotechno-logies, research and development, renewableenergy resources, the electro-technical in-dustry, development of production focusingon ecologically clean activities which will notfurther burden the environment, and secur-ing as high as possible finalisation ofproducts.”

Several traditional industrial sectors inthe region also remain prospective, especiallymetallurgy, wood processing, engineering,glass, and agriculture, according to Brieda.

“Mining and its related processing in-dustry in the so-called silicate zone in thesouthern part of the region is also very pro-spective because of the rich deposits of min-eral raw materials,” said Brieda.

Both Kodríková and Slobodová also seetourism, wellness facilities, and other ser-vices as particularly promising.

“The region has excellent prerequisitesfor further tapping of tourism,” saidKodríková. “In the north are the Low Tatraswhich are suitable for summer as well aswinter tourism and to the west are BanskáŠtiavnica and Kremnica with their rich min-ing history. The east is rich in Gothic attrac-tions which can be found along the SlovakGothic Route and the whole region is dottedwith spas, for instance in Brusno, Sliač andDudince, to mention just a few.”

JB: Decentralisationshould continue

Continued from pg 6

TSS: How do you rate the cur-rent degree of decentralisa-tion in Slovakia, along withthe current powers and du-ties of the self-governing re-gions?

JB: One of the tools to re-duce regional disparities, asidefrom the measures taken bythe national government, isalso the development policy ofindividual regional govern-ments.

Slovakia had to create self-governing regions before itsadmission into the EU [Ed.note: Slovakia entered the EUon May 1, 2004].

Nowadays these adminis-trations bear responsibility forhelping to remove regionaldisparities.

It is necessary to continuetransferring competencies,and thus also the funds neces-sary for their performance. It isalso necessary to cancel somestate authorities operating atthe regional level, for examplein the area of education ortransport, because the regionalgovernments are now fullysubstituting them. The aimshould be to facilitate the pub-lic administration for citizens.

TSS: Slovakia suffers from re-gional disparities. Does thisproblem also affect your re-gion? In which segments doyou perceive the biggest dis-parities and what solutionsdo you propose?

JB: To reduce regional dis-parities the Žilina Self-Govern-

ing Region has created its ownmechanisms.

We annually allocate fin-ancial resources from the re-gional budget to promote vari-ous projects covering regionaldevelopment, tourism andculture promotion, etc., whilewe put an accent on propor-tional allocation of fundingpackages to all five sub-re-gions.

Through the rural devel-opment grant we subsidiserural areas which are outsideof the centres of innovationand economic growth.

Another tool of support isthe grant system for culture,within which we annually se-lectively allocate grants tospecific culture projects.

Via the tourism develop-ment promotion grant, we se-cure the development of tour-ism in the historical regions ofKysuce, Orava, Liptov, Turiecand Horné Považie, each ofwhich has its own specificcharacteristics and attracts adifferent tourist clientele. Apartfrom municipalities, in addi-tion entrepreneurs from thefield of tourism can be involvedin this system. We have alreadyhelped and supported hundredsof projects in this way.

Reducing of regional dis-parities is also closely connec-ted with the transport infra-structure construction.

Following the last year, theŽilina Self-Governing Regionis continuing the extensivereconstruction of the second-and third-category roads inour region.

BY JANA LIPTÁKOVÁSpectator staff

UNESCO listed: Tvrdošín's wooden church. Photo: Jana Liptáková

9February 1 – 7, 2010BUSINESS FOCUS

AUTO: Prospects for car industry look goodContinued from pg 6

So far, the company has in-vested €1 billion in its facilities.It currently assembles threemodels and employs 2,800 work-ers. Thousands more employeeswork for its subcontractors inSlovakia, for example DongWong Metal Industry, Mobis,and Hysco.

According to Nemešová, thecharacter of completed invest-ment projects over the 2002-2008period confirmed a continuing,intensive trend in the expansionof the automotive industry. Of atotal of 36 completed invest-ment projects, with planned in-vestments of €1.123 billion andexpected creation of 6,883 to8,145 new jobs, 36 percent werein the automotive industry, in-cluding projects by Kyokutoh,Faurecia, Glovis Company andRoadster Automotive.

More than one-fifth of thetotal investment (22 percent) inthe region was directed towardthe engineering and metal-pro-cessing industry (TFC Cable As-semblies, Gruppo Amaya Teller-ia) and 17 percent flowed into theelectro-technical industry (SPIN-tech, Eltec Energy, and TECO).Firms in the chemical industryaccounted for 8 percent of theinvestments (DKI Plast andGassman Kunstofftechnik) whilethe remaining investments werein the construction, wood, andtextile industries, according toNemešová.

Economic crisisbites in the region

Due to the openness of itseconomy and the fact that carsales and production have beenone of the hardest hit economicsectors throughout the world,Žilina Region has felt some deepimpacts from the crisis, too. Atthe end of December 2009, theunemployment rate in the ŽilinaRegion was 10.89 percent, ac-cording to the Labour, Social Af-fairs and Family Office, nearingthe level from 2004, at 11.12 at theend of December.

The gross domestic productgenerated by industry in the re-gion decreased by about 20 to 23percent in 2009 compared withthe previous year while the con-struction sector registered anannual drop of about 10 percent,according to the Žilina regionalchamber of the Slovak Chamberof Commerce and Industry (ŽRKSOPK). Transport-generated

GDP fell by over one-quarter inthe domestic market and inter-national transport shrank byabout 17 percent.

Ján Mišura, the head of theŽilina regional chamber, is dis-appointed by the lack of a morefavourable attitude by bankstowards helping regional busi-ness entities.

“Comparing figures from2008 with those from 2009 showsthat small and medium-sizedcompanies have had to pay forturbulences in the financialsector,” Mišura told The SlovakSpectator. “Large companies,with their experience, are morecapable of adapting to thechanged economic situation andfinding a way out. It creates ahope that they will be able to re-vitalise the need for small andmedium-sized companies. Un-fortunately, the banking sector –in spite of its improved liquidityresulting from the adoption ofthe euro – has acted neutrally, inthe best case. In some cases thesector has even attempted to in-crease fees for administration ofaccounts and other services. Thisis causing problems for localcompanies in both industry andservices to finance their launchof work on new orders for 2010.”

Support for investmentand growth

Along with the already es-tablished automotive industry,engineering, information-communication technologies,electro-technical, electronics,paper production, wood pro-cessing, construction and tour-ism are seen as good prospectsfor the further development ofthe region. This is because of

the existing, well-educated la-bour force and the good level ofvocational and higher educa-tion in the region.

“With regards to the strongengineering tradition, still relat-ively high unemployment rate,which was only a bit below 11percent in December 2009 andthe renowned Žilina University,Žilina Region represents a verysuitable location for invest-ments, especially into the auto-motive industry,” saidNemešová. Žilina University hasa strong tradition in higher edu-cation in the fields of transporta-tion and communications aswell as in mechanical, electricaland civil engineering.

“In the future we also expectan inflow of investment into thelaunch of technical servicecentres, IT centres, and callcentres,” said Nemešová. “Sim-ultaneously, Žilina Region cre-ates a great potential for tourisminvestments since the regionboasts top ski resorts, thermalspas, natural reserves and UN-ESCO sites.”

To support development oflocal business Žilina Self-Govern-ing Region has prepared a Cata-logue of the Investment Oppor-tunities of Žilina Region which isavailable in English as well asSlovak. Via its internet version,the catalogue provides compre-hensive information about theregion, its economy and infra-structure as well as an overviewof existing investment oppor-tunities in the region.

When listing the activitiesthat the Žilina regional chamberhas organised to support eco-nomic development of the re-gion, Mišura mentioned its pub-lication of the "Catalogue of Re-

commended Companies in theSub-Regions of Liptov, Orava,Turiec, Považie and Kysuce" for2009 and 2010. It distributes thiscatalogue throughout Žilina re-gion, across Slovakia, and inter-nationally as well as at fairs andwithin the network of chambersof industry and commerce.

The Žilina regional chamber,in cooperation with the ŽilinaSelf-Governing Region, up-datesthe database of companies andentrepreneurs available atwww.interbiznis.sk and atwww.viator.sk, the regionaltourism portal. Entrepreneurscan look for detailed informationon suppliers and offers at thewebsite of SOPK. The regionalchamber also offers advice tobusiness entities and will beproviding financial assistance tocompanies attending engineer-ing, electro-technical, construc-tion and tourism fairs in Poland,Sweden, Serbia, Romania, Be-larus, and other countries thisyear. It has also organised trademissions and exhibitions withinSlovakia and abroad, for examplein Russia, Austria, Poland andChina and the so far not fully-saturated Balkan market.

“Within other activities, weare fundamentally supportingacceleration of construction ofthe main European E50 and E75corridors, designed a long timeago, which cross Žilina Region,so that they gain the form of truehighways,” said Mišura. He ad-ded that the recent problemsduring the launch of the elec-tronic toll collection system onthe main European north-southE75 corridor at Slovakia’s borderswith the Czech Republic and Po-land have uncovered a weakpoint for the region and all ofSlovakia – the incomplete high-way between Svrčinec nearČadca and Zwardoň to Warsaw.

According to Mišura, incom-plete highway infrastructurecontinues to be the mainhindrance to further develop-ment of the business sphere inthe region.

“The biggest hurdle to fur-ther development of business inthe Žilina region is the construc-tion of the highway tunnelbetween Martin and Žilina thatwas halted in 2003,” said Mišura.“Despite promises, this best-prepared construction project onthe main European west-eastE50 corridor has been moved intoonly the third package of public-private partnership projects forhighway construction,” he said.

Trucks queuing at a Slovak-Polish border crossing. Photo: TASR

Frequency discounts:● 3x - 10x 5%● 11x - 19x 7,5%● 20x and more 15%

NOTE: Prices do not include value addedtax (VAT 19%)!DEADLINE: Wednesday, 12:00,for publication that week; otherwise, theadvert will be published the followingFriday.FOR MORE INFORMATION: email:marta.fukasova@spectator.sktel: +421 2 59 233-311fax: +421 2 59 233-319or write: The Slovak Spectator Lazaretská 12, 811 08 Bratislava, Slovakia.

1/48 page

44 x 41 mm

25(Sk753.15)

1/12 page

91,5 x 87 mm

100

(Sk3,012.60)

1/24 page

44 x 87 mm91,5 x 41 mm

50(Sk1,506.3)

Advertising rates for business classifieds

or

2. Prices for business classified ads (according to size):

22.. PPrriicceess ffoorr bbuussiinneessss ccllaassssiiffiieedd

aaddss (according to size)::

1. Prices of classified ads

(according to no. of words)

● Up to 20words - 10 (Sk301.26)

● Up to 50 words - 20 (Sk602.52)

● Up to 70 words - 30 (Sk903.78)

● Up to 100 words - 40 (Sk1,200.04)

● Up to 150 words - 60 (Sk1,807.56)

Additional options

● Logo or picture insertion

+ 7 (Sk210.88)

● Bold or capital bold letters

+ 0.3/word (Sk9.04)

● Box + 3 (Sk90.38)

● Box with shading + 7 (Sk210.88)

1 = Sk30.1260

RELIGIOUS SERVICES

ENGLISH LANGUAGE WORSHIPBratislava International Church

Sundays, 9:30 at historic Small Lutheran Church

(Malý evanjelický kostol) in central Bratislava (near Hodzovo namestie); on Lycejna at intersection

with Panenska 26/28.Children's Sunday School provided.

Everyone Welcome.Information at 02-5443-3263

Web Site: www.bratislavainternationalchurch.org

C 3573

CLASSIFIEDS

INVESTMENT AdvisoryGUIDE 2009

ORDER NOW!

Price per copy €4

Contact our Circulation Department: tel: +421 (0)2 59 233 300, fax: +421 (0)2 59 233 319 e-mail: circulation@spectator.sk, or spectator@spectator.sk

Apartments – houses - for RENT!

• 2-room furnished apartments - Ružinov, Karlove Ves, Vajnorská,...

• 3-4-room new, furnished apartments – city center, Bôrik, KarlovaVes,….

• family houses – Kramáre, Polusarea, Koliba, Vrakuňa,.....

www.madison.sk, 0905 - 659156,madison@nextra.sk

REAL ESTATE

C 3489

SP90021/5

ADVERTISEMENT

JOB OFFERS

Any interesting job offers

listed above? Find out

more at www.profesia.sk

.NET/C# Developer (senior, junior)PORTHUS SLOVAKIA s.r.o. (Information Technology), Žilina

Min. education: University education (Bachelor‘s degree)

Languages: English - intermediate

Technical Accountant - Claims Swiss Re Business Services (Slovakia) s.r.o. (Insurance), Bratislava

Min. education: University education (Bachelor‘s degree)

Languages: English - advanced

Assistant Financial and Sales DirectorTWOpoint Industry, s.r.o. (Other areas), Košice region, Košice

Min. education: University education (Bachelor‘s degree)

Languages: English - advanced

Transactional ControllerPhilips Slovakia s.r.o. (Electrical engineering), Bratislava

Min. education: University education (Master‘s degree)

Languages: English - advanced and Slovak - advanced

Business Operations ManagerNew Frontier Finance, s.r.o. (Information Technology), Bratislava

Min. education: University education (Master‘s degree)

Languages: English - expert (interpreting)

Assistant to plant manager Holcim (Slovensko) a. s. (Construction industry), Rohožník

Min. education: University education (Master‘s degree)

Languages: Slovak - native speaker and English - advanced

AnalystAccenture, s.r.o. (Information Technology), Bratislava

Min. education: University education (Master‘s degree)

Languages: English - advanced

AMS - Application Developer J2EEIBM International Services Centre s.r.o. (Information Technology), Bratislava

Min. education: University education (Master‘s degree)

Languages: English - advanced or German - intermediate

Account ExecutiveGrayling Slovakia s. r. o. (Advertising, promotion, PR), Bratislava

Min. education: University education (Bachelor‘s degree)

Languages: English - advanced

General Affairs ManagerSamsung Electronics LCD Slovakia s.r.o. (Electrical engineering), Trnava,

Voderady

Min. education: University education (Master‘s degree)

Languages: English - advanced

SAP NuclearSlovenské elektrárne, a.s. (Production, distribution of electricity), Bratislava

Min. education: University education (Master‘s degree)

Languages: English - intermediate

Financial ManagerSTROJKOV ENGINEERING, s.r.o. (Engineering industry), Gelnica

Min. education: University education (Bachelor‘s degree)

Languages: English - advanced

Senior Architect NESS KDC, s.r.o. (Information Technology), Košice region, Košice

Min. education: University education (Bachelor‘s degree)

Languages: English - advanced

SAP Industrial Specialist VALEO SLOVAKIA, s.r.o. (Automotive Industry), Košice

Min. education: University education (Master‘s degree)

Languages: English - advanced

10 February 1 – 7, 2010 CULTURE

Western SLOVAKIA

Bratislaval DESIGN: Twenty after Twenty- This exhibition presents thecreative approach and ways ofthinking of young architects.Twenty Czech and twenty Slovakstudios were chosen; but the ex-hibits presented surprise – dog-houses in the Czech designs andbird-boxes in the Slovak ones.

Open: Mon-Fri 10:00-18:00,Sat-Sun 13:00-18:00; until Febru-ary 7. Admission: free. DesignFactory, Bottova 2. Tel: 0907666-718; www.designfactory.sk.

Bratislaval MUSIC/DANCE: Everest – Mu-sician Pavol Hammel, choreo-grapher Mário Radačovský anddirector Patrik Lančarič createdthis musical-dance theatre as asymbol of the struggle to con-quer one’s own individualMount Everest, day after day.

Starts: February 3, 19:00; Feb-ruary 6, 19:00. Admission: €8 -€16. New building of the Nation-al Theatre, Pribinova 17. Tel:02/2047-2111, www.snd.sk.

Bratislaval CLASSICAL MUSIC: CappellaIstropolitana and guests – TheChamber Orchestra of the City ofBratislava led by Robert Marečekand conducted by KasparZehnder from Switzerland, withZehnder, Milan Radič, Eva Arou-tunian, and Radek Barborákplaying, will offer a real delicacy.

Starts: February 7, 17:00. Ad-mission: €4. Primaciálny palác(Primate's Palace), Primaciál–ne nám. Tel: 02/5935-6222;www.visit.bratislava.sk.

Bratislaval LIVE MUSIC: Tango Argentino– A unique experience will beoffered by Tango Ultimo withMarcel Palonder, and later byAlejandro Ziegler from BuenosAires with his acoustic quartetplaying famous pieces. Before,there will be a dance workshopwith Paľo Moises, and after-wards a disco with DJ Shantisan.

Starts: February 3, 20:00.Admission: €15. Nu SpiritBar, Šafárikovo námestie 7.www.nuspirit.sk.

Trnaval EXHIBITION: Martich Kochan

Katedrály periférie – Cathedralsof the Periphery. This photo ex-hibition by a young Trnava au-thor, a student of the Art Schoolof the Brno University of Tech-nology, moves the art of archi-tecture to objects.

Open: Tue-Fri 09:00-17:00,Sat-Sun 13:00-18:00, until Febru-ary 14. Admission: €0.60-€1.30.Kopplova vila, Zelený kríček 3.Tel: 033/5511-659; www.gjk.sk.

Levicel MUSEUM: Čaj - nápoj náškaždodenný – Tea - our dailydrink. An exhibition about thehistory of a ritual. Put togetherby the Museum of Ján Thain inNové Zámky.

Open: Mon-Fri 09:00-16:00,Sun 10:00-16:00. Admission:€0.30-€0.60. Kapitánska budovav hradnom areáli (Captain’sBuilding in the castle complex),Sv. Michala 40. Tel.: 036/6312-112;www.muzeumlevice.sk.

Central SLOVAKIA

Banská Bystrical EXHIBITION: To vajíčkomaľovanô – The Decorated Egg isan exhibition that runs untilEaster and shows the still-livingtradition of decorated Easter

eggs from the whole of Slovakia.The egg continues to symbolisethe spring and fertility.

Open: February 4 till April 4,Mon-Fri 09:00-17:00, Sun10:00-17:00. Admission: €0.50 -€1. Thurzov dom, Nám.SNP 4. Tel.: 048 / 412 58 97;www.stredoslovenskemuzeum.sk.

Žilinal DANCE: Lord of the Dance –Michael Flatley returns to Slov-akia with his ensemble of dan-cers to once again show the ma-gic and universal language ofdance through a traditional Irishroutine that began humbly andhas since captivated thousandsof fans all over the world.

Starts: February 8, 20:00.Zimný štadión (Ice Sta–dium) Garmin Aréna, Športo–vá 5. Admission: from €30.Tel: 041/5621-676, 02/5293-3321;www.ticketportal.sk.

Eastern SLOVAKIA

Košicel EXHIBITION: MetamorfózyStarého mesta – The Meta-morphoses of the Old Town anexhibition of photographs byTibor Kováč, presents a view ofthe city, its history, and the lifeof a man brutally changed by thearrival in Czechoslovakia of theSoviet Army in 1968.

Open: Mon-Fri 09:00-18:00,Sat-Sun 10:00-17:00, until February15. Admission: free. Atrium of theTeologická Fakulta Katolíckej Uni-verzity Ružomberok, Hlavná 89.Tel: 055/6836-335; www.ktfke.sk.

Spišská Nová Vesl FOLKLORE/DANCE:Fašiangová veselica – The Shrove(or carnival) time means theperiod of fun, folklore marches-and dances that begins afterChristmas and ends by the Lent.This Shrove Dance is organisedby the folklore group Čečina.

Starts: February 5, 19:00. Ad-mission: €20. Reštaurácia Tatra.Tel: 053/4425-652, 053/4423-249,www.mkc.snv.sk.

By Zuzana Vilikovská

The winter has come at last

FINALLY, the end of January and early Februaryhas given us a proper winter with freezing tem-peratures all day long and frigid conditions atnight. But we still lack a good measure of snowfall.For example, the 30 centimetres of natural snow atŠtrbské Pleso and the 85 centimetres at Chopok arefar too little for the beginning of February. A nor-mal base of snow would be over 1metre – but wewill probably need to wait a little longer for that.

In coming days, the snow situation could im-prove and on Tuesday and Wednesday it is pos-sible that 20 to 40 centimetres of new snow couldfall. That would likely enable resort operators toopen more slopes, especially in the higher altitudeski resorts that require more snow. In the remain-ing days of this week, milder snowfalls are expec-ted and as the week ends clear weather is expectedagain, with temperatures sinking to as low asminus 20 in some mountain valleys.

This Saturday, the biggest Slovak snowboardevent will take place – SKOČSY at Štrbské Pleso,where top European competitors will perform in afreestyle show at the snowboard park. Anotherround of SNOW SHOW in the area of Nová Hoľa atDonovaly will be organised for the weekend withcompetitions, music, dancing, various skiingpresentations and special drinks.

By Roman Millan, www.lanovky.sk

Rača’s Lutheran church

THE PRESENT-DAY Bratislava district of Rača wasonce a separate settlement known as Račišdorf,and was visited by people from the nearby citymainly to sample its excellent wine. Račišdorfused to be ethnically diverse. The majority of itsinhabitants were Slovaks, who lived mostly at the“Lower End” (Dolný Koniec). The “Upper End”(Horný Koniec) was inhabited by a large Germancommunity. The range of ethnicities also includeda group of Croatian residents.

In terms of religion, Rača, like most municipal-ities in Slovakia, was divided principally betweenCatholics and Lutheran Protestants. The Luther-ans built their existing church in 1834; before then,they had held services wherever the opportunityarose. When, in the 16th century, the ideas of theReformation came to Rača they found a dedicatedsupporter in the person of Count Siegfried Ko-lonich. The formation of new Lutheran bodies at-tracted mainly local Germans. The first Lutheranchurch in Rača was a chapel which used to be partof Count Kolonich’s mansion. Later during theReformation Lutherans took over the Catholic par-ish church for half a century. This caused great an-imosity between local Catholics and Lutheransthat continued for decades.

In 1629 the church was returned to the Cathol-ics, and in 1637 Rača’s new landlord, FrantišekKeglevič, a Catholic, ordered that the Lutheranpreacher Rudolf Mueller be cast out of the village.During the Counter-Reformation, the Lutherans

lost their property and were forced to meet secretlyin cellars to listen to preachers. Later, after theEdict of Tolerance was issued by Emperor Jozef II,the Rača Germans attended services in Bratislava.Finally, in 1834, they were able to build their ownchurch. It is shown in this rare photo, dating backto WWI, in which a soldier is pictured next to it.

By BranislavChovan

THE AUSTRIAN Cultural Forum presents an exhibition called ViennaReloaded in Bratislava that stems from a TV documentary of thesame name that illustrated the role of the Austrian capital in advan-cing activities like science, art, and architecture within a unitedEurope. Six artists and six architects offer their exhibits until February26 at the Austrian Culture Forum at Zelená 7, Mon-Fri 10:00-17:00; ad-mission is free. For more information, call 02/5464-1337 or go towww.rakusko.eu/sk. Photo: Courtesy of RKF

THE CENTRAL-Slovakian Gallery in Banská Bystrica is showing theexhibition The Romance of My Young Days, the Future of My Nostal-gia Part 2. It includes a case study of the nostalgia and romantic sen-timent connected with the pop-culture of the 1980s in then-commun-ist eastern Europe, which adopted parts of western pop-culture thatfiltered through the strict censorship. It also includes the archives ofThe Working Memory and can be seen until February 28, Tue-Sun10:00-17:00 and Sat-Sun 10:00-16:00 at the Praetorium building, S.Moyses Square 25 for €0.50-€1.33. For more info, call 048/4701-624 orgo to www.ssgbb.sk. Photo: Courtesy of SSGBB

HISTORY TALKS EVENTS COUNTRYWIDE

I n c o o p e r a t i o n w i t h t h e S l o v a k H y d r o m e t e o r o l o g i c a l I n s t i t u t e

Weather updates and forecasts from across Slovakiacan now be found at www.spectator.sk.

N A M E D A Y F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 0

Monday

Tatiana

February 1

Tuesday

ErikErika

February 2

Wednesday

BlaÏej

February 3

Thursday

Veronika

February 4

Friday

Agáta

February 5

Saturday

Dorota

February 6

Sunday

Vanda

February 7

A Slovak’s name day (meniny) is as important as his or her birthday. It is traditional to present friends or co-workers with a small gift, such as chocolates or flowers, and to wish them Všetko najlepšie k meninám (Happy name day)

Ski conditions around Slovakia (as of January 28)

CENTRE SNOW CONDITIONS SKI PASS PRICE IN € LIFTS IN OPERATION

Donovaly 40 cm very good €22 7/15Jasná – Sever 80 cm very good €29 10/24Chopok – Juh 80 cm very good €19 5/7Martinské hole 65 cm very good €22 1/6Štrbské Pleso 80 cm very good €22 5/6Lomnické sedlo unsuitable Tatranská Lomnica 90 cm very good €28 9/14Zverovka 60 cm very good €20 4/4Skipark Ružomberok 50 cm very good €22 6/8Vrátna 60 cm very good €22 7/15Veľká Rača 40 cm very good €22 5/7Kosodrevina - Chopok unsuitable

SKI WINDOW

Still not enough snow. Photo: Roman Millan

Foxes steal the show

ALŽBETA, a Slovak girl in herearly twenties, desperately seeksa new life in Dublin where shewants to work as au-pair. Tooproud and jealous, she con-stantly refuses any help from herolder sister Tina, who is engagedto a local, Steve. Only after thetwo sisters decide to discuss along-buried secret can their rela-tionship finally be restored.

This is the plotline of Foxes(Líštičky), Slovak director MiraFornay’s debut feature, now be-ing screened in domesticcinemas. The first Slovak movieto have been premiered inVenice for a quarter of a century,this character-driven dramaabout Slovak immigrants in Ire-land has, since its domesticpremiere shortly before the endof 2009, attracted several thou-sand cinemagoers.

And this is only the begin-ning, its authors say. It is nowbeing presented at the Rotter-dam Film Festival, and the filmwill then head to the Berlinalenext week, the Jameson DublinFilm Festival at the end of Febru-ary, and, very shortly, also tocinema screens around Europe.

The 32-year-old director,who before Foxes had madearound a dozen short films,graduated from Prague’sAcademy of Performing Arts andLondon’s National Film andTelevision School. It was duringher studies in the UK that sherealised that no one had everportrayed the intimate stories ofSlovak economic migrants.

“The film market is saturatedwith movies representing im-migrants as victims of their hostcountries who have been abusedby the majority society, such asLilya 4-ever or Import Export,”Fornay told The Slovak Spectator.“What I am interested in is amore realistic and perhaps amore detached view of how thissystem can equally be exploited

and how immigrants can survivethis struggle.”

This also explains the titleof the film. Dublin is wellknown for its high populationof urban foxes strolling downpublic roads and Fornay sees aparallel between these half-domesticated animals andpeople working abroad.

“Urban foxes have an incred-ible survival instinct,” she said.“Moreover, they survive onleftovers just like immigrantsand though they cannot returnto the woods anymore, every-body looks at them as if theywere aliens, which once againreminds me of immigrants.”

What Fornay herself calls “aseemingly raw, docu-style miseen scene” supported byshoulder-mounted cameraworkand a darkish atmosphere is usedto explore the protagonists’minds “without falling intomoralistic sermonising”.

This was important for thedirector as she wanted to takedistance of the topic. Thoughthere are no autobiographicalepisodes in Foxes, Fornay feelspersonally involved with thecharacters.

“The movie ripened over aperiod of more than five yearsand it shows my subjective per-spective of the world I was thenliving in,” she remarked. “It isnot my personal story, but thereis a piece of myself in virtuallyevery character of Foxes, since Ialso look for love, a sense of se-curity and happiness.”

Satisfaction despitetight budget

To ensure maximum realism,the film was shot entirely in Ire-land, which naturally increasedthe costs. Though the budget wastight, the producers managed tomake ends meet thanks to an in-ternational co-production.

“We obtained grants from Ir-ish, Czech as well as Slovak insti-tutions, so we gathered a sumsufficient for a low-cost debut,”said Juraj Buzalka, one of thefilm’s producers. “Despite thecomparatively limited resourcesand very few shooting days, weare extremely satisfied with theresult. I think Mira Fornay offersa very fresh perspective of wo-men in this ‘age of migration’.She really does not spare herprotagonists and she wants toprovoke discussion. That is, inmy opinion, why Foxes goes to somany prestigious festivals.”

Ľubica Orechovská, PR man-ager of Foxes, also expressed hercontentment with the finalshape of the film, and especiallywith its reception.

“During just the first weekafter its release in Slovakia morethan 1,000 people saw the movieand around 4,000 tickets havebeen sold to this day, which is, Ibelieve, a remarkable figure giv-en the local context,” she said.

According to Aaron Mon-aghan, the Irish actor whoplayed the role of Tina’s fiancéSteve, the greatest asset of Foxeswas a good script.

“Foxes was such a greatscript, it dealt with such sens-itive and topical issues…; thebiggest challenge was work-ing to help turn a great scriptinto a great film,” he told TheSlovak Spectator.

Monaghan also praised thetopicality of Foxes.

“Everyone in Ireland hassome experience of immigrantsin the country and the issue ofimmigrants is a hot topic of de-bate here,” he stated. “There aregood opportunities and incent-ives from our government,though there is sometimes somehostility towards [immigrants]from Irish people themselves.There is a diverse range of issuesabout the immigrant situationin Ireland which I think Foxescaptures perfectly.”

In spite of the positive re-sponse, Fornay, who currentlydivides her time betweenPrague and Berlin, does notplan to continue developing thetopic of immigration in her fu-ture projects.

One of these is already un-derway, but the director is keep-ing the details secret.

“The script has recently re-ceived a Tibor Vichta Award, ithas also been shortlisted for the2011 Krzysztof KieslowskiAward in Cannes, and it hasbeen chosen from among 400projects for a presentation atthis year’s co-production mar-ket at the Berlinale, but this isall I can tell you for themoment,” Fornay concluded.

Slovak actress Reka Derzsi, who plays the heroine of Líštičky, with Jitka Josková (far left) and Aaron Monaghan. Photo: Courtesy of Miras

BY DOMINIKA UHRÍKOVÁSpectator staff

Family dramaabout Slovaks

living in Irelandreceives positive

response

MAŇKA: Schools shouldreflect market needs

Continued from pg 7

To reverse its decline, startup its growth and balance dis-parities across the whole re-gion the state administrationand the self-government mustcarry out fundamental trans-formation projects to equipthis region with the necessaryinfrastructure related to trans-port, social security, educa-tion, health care, environ-ment, and innovations via pro-duction technologies, researchand development, education,informatisation, and so forth.

There are currently threemain financial resources avail-able to undertake the requiredchanges: the budget of theBanská Bystrica Self-Govern-ing Region, the National Stra-tegic Reference Frameworkand investments.

The biggest problem in thefunctioning of the BanskáBystrica Self-Governing Regionoffice itself is bad financialmanagement during previousyears and its high indebted-ness. Lower collection of taxescaused by increasing unem-ployment is also having a neg-ative impact on the operationof the office. The actual collec-tion of taxes [ed. note: which isone of the primary sources ofincome for self-governing re-gions], is even significantlylower than the originalplanned budget.

During my first days in of-fice we have identified four ba-sic groups of risk.

The first one is a lack offunds to cover valid obliga-tions. The second group is re-lated to a lack of funds to secureperformance of basic functionsof the office in maintaining so-cial standards. The sectors ofsocial security, education,transport and culture do nothave funds, especially to coverwages and operating costs.Funds in the budget will haveto be either increased or somebasic functions of the BanskáBystrica Self-Governing Regionmay need to be limited andsome investments related tomaintenance and developmentof infrastructure under theauspices of our office may needto be postponed. A combina-tion of the last two is also pos-sible. The third risk is a lack ofmoney for obligatory co-finan-cing of projects under the Na-tional Strategic ReferenceFramework.

The last, but not least im-portant, risk is ineffective useof funds because of duplicationwithin some projects. On thebasis of a deeper analysis wewill identify any such projectsand secure the active participa-tion of our office in them. Af-terwards, we will halt or fun-damentally alter any suchprojects financed doubly fromour budget.

TSS: How do you perceive thecurrent extent of decentral-isation in Slovakia, alongwith the current powers andduties of self-governing re-gions?

VM: Even though as aformer mayor I have experi-ence in self-government, myperception of the powers and

obligations of the regional self-governments will be more ob-jective once I have served inmy current post for more thanjust a few days.

The powers and responsib-ilities of the self-governingregions significantly influ-ence the day-to-day lives ofcitizens in the regions. I see itas important to increase thepowers of the offices of self-governing regions to draw EUfunds via regional operationalprogrammes so that peoplewho have detailed informa-tion about what is happeningin a region can directly decideon funds.

Self-governing regionshave significant powers in thefield of secondary school edu-cation by setting the numberof classes and authorising andcancelling fields of study. I seehuge possibilities in optim-ising the network of second-ary schools with a stress onprospective fields of studylinked to the regional labourmarket’s needs.

We cannot open fields ofstudies from which graduates,after completing their studies,go directly to unemploymentoffices.

TSS: Slovakia suffers from re-gional disparities. Does thisproblem affect your region?In which areas do you per-ceive the biggest disparitiesand what solutions do youpropose?

VM: Banská Bystrica Re-gion is the most rural region ofSlovakia and simultaneouslythe region with the biggest re-gional disparities within it.

We have districts in ourregion in which unemploy-ment is below 10 percent, forexample in Banská Bystricaand Zvolen, but we also havedistricts like Rimavská Sobotaand Revúca in which it ex-ceeds 30 percent.

More than half of the dis-tricts in our region are signi-ficantly lagging behind, oreven marginalised. This iswhy it is necessary to come upwith new, innovative, region-al policies. We have to supportthe competitiveness of devel-oping areas especiallythrough concentration ofsupport for science, research,innovations and education.Support for their developmentprogrammes based on theirneeds and priorities are thekey to higher employment inlagging districts.

So far the Banská BystricaSelf-Governing Region has notcreated any special instru-ments for effective policy forbalancing inter-regional dis-parities. The same support in-struments were applied forlagging as well as more de-veloped districts. This hasshown itself to be ineffectiveand inter-regional disparitieskept deepening because smal-ler, less-developed districtswere not able to fairly competein grant competitions withmore-developed districts.

Thus, it is necessary to cre-ate instruments which willspecifically focus support to in-crease the competitiveness oflagging districts.

Foxes' creators, including director Mira Fornay (centre), at the film's premiere. Photo: Courtesy of Miras

CULTURE / BUSINESS FOCUS 11February 1 – 7, 2010

12 February 1 – 7, 2010 FEATURE

Bear census postponed afteragreement is delayed

A PROJECT to count all the bearsin Slovakia has been delayed andmay only be launched fully thisspring. State Nature Protection(ŠOP), the body in charge of theproject, had intended for it tobegin in the autumn but insteadwaited for the signing of anagreement with the Environ-ment Ministry that was onlycompleted in mid December.Both Vladimír Antal of ŠOP andministry spokesperson JanaKaplanová confirmed the detailsto the ČTK newswire. The min-istry is waiting for the censusresults in order to resolve an ar-gument about the number ofbears living in Slovakia: envir-onmentalists claim there are toofew of them, while forest man-agers claim there are too many.

A tender will be held tochoose a company that will

then take about 3,000 excre-ment specimens, Antal ex-plained. Based on the droppingsand their analysis, the forestmanagers also want to find outabout the health, populationstructure, population densityand genetic fitness of Slovakia’sbears. Fifteen animals will alsobe caught and given a transmit-ter. The ŠOP will, however,have to prolong the project andits outcome for one year, untilthe end of 2013, as the monitor-ing and research of large wildanimals in Slovakia, costing€2.1 million, will be financedfrom EU funds. The ŠOP nowhas to wait until spring, asbears hibernate during winter.

On January 25, according toan old Slovak saying, bears turnover in their sleep. January 25 isthe Christian holiday of the

“Reversing of St. Paul” whenbears are supposed to turn fromone side to the other. Accordingto Miroslav Saniga from the Re-search Branch of the Institute ofForest Ecology of the SlovakAcademy of Sciences, this say-ing is hard to prove ‘on site’, butmight be true since the end ofJanuary usually marks the half-way point in the bears’ hiberna-tion. If left undisturbed, bearstypically sleep until March, theTASR newswire wrote.

However, this winter, withits rapid changes in weather andboth freezing temperatures andquite warm periods, could provevery difficult for the bears, andsome might already have takena break. Two bears in the VeľkáFatra mountain range and onenear Staré Hory awoke duringmild weather at the end of 2009.

Fair attracts gourmandsBRATISLAVA'SIncheba Expocentre hosted twobig fairs on Janu-ary 23 and 24: theITF Slovakiatour

tourism and travel fair, andDanubius Gastro 2010, a gastro-nomy fair.

“In spite of the crisis, bothfairs and their related exhibitionsand events were successful. Therate of visitors increased year-on-year by five percent,” Inchebaspokesperson Martina Sekulovátold the TASR newswire, addingthat the 34,500 square metres ofexhibition area were filled by 768exhibitors, both domestic andforeign, from 31 countries.

The ITF was attended by tour-operators, foreign embassies,travel agencies, Slovak and for-eign regions, and tourism ser-vices providers.

Meanwhile, the DanubiusGastro presented products andservices related to gastronomy,the food-processing industryand the hotel trade. The publicshowed an interest in gastro-nomy technology, viticultureand food, and in particular incompetitions to bake dessertsand prepare various drinks.

Both fairs ended with spe-cial events. The 16th Slovakia-

tour concluded with the firstyear of the International Fest-ival of Travel Films CameraSlovakia. Danubiana Gastroended by holding, for the firsttime, a national round of theprestigious Bocuse D’Or‘culinary olympics’. This waswon by Martin Korbelič, fol-lowed by Peter Duranský andMarcel Ihnačák, all of themfrom Bratislava.

Exquisite exhibits at Danubius Gastro 2010. Photo: SITA

SP90174/2

BERLINBRATISLAVABUCHARESTBUDAPESTDRESDENDÜSSELDORFFRANKFURT/M.KIEVMOSCOWMUNICHNEW YORKPRAGUEWARSAW

NOERR.COM

Noerr

EXCELLENCECREATING VALUENoerr is one of the leading European commercial law firms – with 13 offices and over 450 professionals. Our core business is excellent legal and tax advice.

- in selected areas of commercial law- practice-oriented and on solid academic foundations- with focus on sectors - in close cooperation between partners and clients- with strategic vision

Together with our cooperation partners management consultants and auditors, we develop comprehensive legal, tax, finance and management solutions.

Networked thinking and innovation for the benefit of our clients.

Zuzana WohlmuthNoerr s.r.o.AC DiplomatPalisády 29/A811 06 BratislavaSlovenskoT +421-(0)2-59 10 10 10F +421-(0)2-59 10 10 11recepciaba@noerr.com

www.noerr.com

Hardly any other instrument has so influenced the development of mobility as the wind tunnel. With the use of the wind tunnel, since the beginning of the previous century, scientists have continuously developed the aerodynamic and aeroacoustic quality of motor cars, airships and buildings. Today, excellent values ensure low consumption and longer useful life – Excellence Creating Value.

Still snowing: Bears sometimes wake early from their winter hibernation. Photo: Sme - Ján Krošlák

1

AROUND SLOVAKIAcompiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports