The covers and editorials from leading weeklies of the Left and Right for the work-week ending Friday, 24 March 2020. All our stories about coronavirus and Slovenia are here
Mladina: Počivalšek in dire situation over mask purchases
STA, 24 April 2020 – The left-wing weekly Mladina says in its latest commentary that Economy Minister Zdravko Počivalšek is in a dire position over the blunders with purchases of protective equipment. Not only has he fallen out of favour with PM Janez Janša, he also faces the possibility of the MPs of the party he presides turning their backs on him.
Grega Repovž, the editor-in-chief of the left-leaning weekly, says that considering the developments, it is becoming obvious that the "story about the effective and self-sacrificing campaign to buy masks and other protective equipment will end really badly."
And the person for whom it is to end badly is not just anybody, it is Economy Minister Zdravko Počivalšek, the president of the coalition Modern Centre Party (SMC), who is obviously "not aware yet how large a snowball is descending upon him".
Repovž notes that the minister is not aware that the snowball is not being rolled only by the media, which are the least of a problem, or criminal police officers who investigate the purchases, or the opposition.
"The snowball is now being rolled by the coalition partner Janez Janša. And it is likely that Počivalšek's SMC party, which does not want to go down with him, will join Janša. This is what Počivalšek is actually facing."
The latest discoveries about the purchases have prompted criminal police officers to visit the Agency for Commodity Reserves, with Počivalšek reacting by quickly dismissing its director Anton Zakrajšek, a member of Janša's Democratic Party (SDS).
Zakrajšek, who was on sick leave, said the following day that he was keeping tabs on Počivalšek's dealings, that he knew everything, and that he would talk about this, Repovž adds in the commentary headlined Počivalšek in Dire Straits.
Počivalšek has only small chances of surviving this politically, as protective masks are too sensitive of a matter, and if he is to face a motion of no confidence, it will be really difficult to defend him, even for his own MPs.
"At a certain point, they will realise that they can't defend him. And why would they? Počivalšek himself let everybody know that this is now a party of pure pragmatism. If they have changed political colours and coalition, why would't they replace Počivalšek too?".
Demokracija: Deep left-right differences in response to pandemic
STA, 23 April 2020 – The right-wing Demokracija magazine argues in Thursday's commentary that the left and the right have reacted to the coronavirus crisis in fundamentally different ways, the left "showing yet again how two-faced they are".
When some governments adopted fairly strict measures to prevent the spread of Covid-19, leftists started demanding a free market economy with all the attendant liberties. Together with the mainstream media, they are indignant at people being unable to travel freely, at some shops being closed and suddenly they feel pity for private businesses, the paper says in Chronicles of the Primitive Mind.
"In fact, the virus misfortune has laid painfully bare the difference between the left and right perception of the world. While the left would control and restrict in peacetime and create (anarchistic) chaos in times of crisis, jeopardising human lives, the right resorts to restrictions of human rights and fundamental liberties exclusively in 'wartime' (which a pandemic is) while letting people freely act, work and live in normal circumstances."
What is worst for the left is that people tend to look up to the leaders of nation states in times such as the coronavirus era, rather than expecting salvation from supranational organisations, Demokracija says, noting that leftists see strong nation states, even if their strict measures prove effective, as "a step towards dictatorship".
"This can easily be called a globalist reflex, a primitive mind assuming that a greater number of infected and dead persons is preferable to the right gaining trust among the public. This is why efforts by the coalition need to be cancelled, measures boycotted. Whatever happens, Janša's centre-right government will be blamed anyway.
"This kind of thinking is more primitive than the thinking of an average crook. Whereas the crook allows for the possibility that he may be to blame in certain circumstances (because he did not abide by the rules), leftist crooks (regardless of the circumstances and actions) always claim that somebody else is to blame," the paper concludes.
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