SMER Sees Delayed Decision on its PES Membership as a Good Sign

The party of Prime Minister Robert Fico, SMER-SD, considers it positive that the Party of European Socialists (PES) decided recently to postpone, from June to October, its solution to the dilemma whether to expel SMER-SD or to renew its membership in PES. "If the situation were really so bad, they would have no difficulty deciding right now," said the prime minister's spokesperson, Silvia Glendova, on Wednesday. She stressed that according to Mr. Fico, there has never been a reason to punish SMER by suspending its membership in the PES.
According to Foreign Minister Jan Kubis, PES probably realizes that politics in Slovakia is governed by SMER-SD's philosophy of social democracy. It thus follows, as the minister continued, that PES may admit that the ruling coalition, headed by SMER-SD, does not prevent, and perhaps even enables the application of such politics. He assumes that the European Socialists have apparently not yet reached such a conclusion, which is why they had to take more time for their final decision.
European Socialists suspended SMER-SD's membership in the PES in October of last year. The reason for this was the post-election decision of the party to form a ruling coalition with the nationalist Slovak National Party (SNS). The statutes of PES forbid alliances with far-right parties and extremists. The PES announced that it needs more time to judge the situation in Slovakia. SMER's membership in the PES will be suspended until October, when PES is to again discuss this issue.