Bratislava – Slovakian Prime Minister Igor Matovic on Friday survived a vote of no confidence in parliament, with only 47 lawmakers voting in favour of his dismissal.
Matovic took office four months ago and could have been forced to resign if there had been 76 votes or more against him.
The vote followed a debate that ran from Thursday into early Friday in which opposition politicians accused Matovic of incompetence, dishonesty and fraud.
He countered by criticising the social democratic Smer party, which his government replaced, saying “the squealing you hear here is because we chased the pigs away from their feeding trough.”
When Matovic left parliament just before midnight, members of the radical right-wing LSNS (People’s Party Our Slovakia) had occupied the podium for about three-quarters of an hour.
They successfully forced Matovic, who had apparently gone home in the meantime, to return to parliament to continue listening to the accusations against him.
Smer tabled the motion for a no-confidence vote after it was revealed by left-wing newspaper Dennik N that Matovic plagiarized his university thesis and cheated in other papers during his degree, which he later admitted to.
Matovic defended himself in parliament and said his thesis was not as big a problem as corruption, which he has repeatedly vowed to clean up.
(dpa/NAN)
