Five centre-left parties expect to win election
Ljubljana - The new Freedom Movement party and the four opposition parties associated in the informal KUL coalition are convinced they will win the general election on Sunday and form a stable government. Their leaders said that the five parties operated as a well-coordinated team as they addressed the press on Friday before the election blackout sets in.
"This election will be a referendum on whether we want to see what we've been seeing over the last two years or whether we want to be a normal democracy again, a normal Slovenia, the kind we were used to," said LMŠ leader Marjan Šarec.
SAB leader Alenka Bratušek warned that their political opponents were trying hard to prevent people from the centre-left from going to the polls. But she is convinced that "they will not succeed." She expects a victory on Sunday and then a solid government team "with the knowledge and experience to put Slovenia on the right track".
The Left's leader Luka Mesec said the five parties were diverse, featuring "socialists, ecologists, social democrats and liberals", stressing "the choice is varied". He said it was not necessary for each individual party to defeat the Democrats (SDS), "it's essential that we defeat them together".
Urging citizens to go to the polls, he said that "if the turnout is good, the five parties can form a constitutional majority". He is convinced the Left will be in the new government.
SocDem leader Tanja Fajon said she was proud that so many people turned out to vote in early voting, so she is convinced that "Sunday will be a winning day, a victory for democracy". She pledged their centre-left government "will not repeat the mistakes of past centre-left governments" because they have learnt a lot over the past year.
Just like Mesec, the Freedom Movement's vice president Urška Klakočar Zupančič said it was not important which of the five parties voters will vote for because "we all share the same values and we promote Slovenia becoming a law-governed democracy", as she pointed to what she sees as a disintegration of the rule of law in Slovenia.
The joint statement has been described by some commentators as an attempt by the Freedom Movement to provide a boost to the smaller centre-left parties whose election result will be instrumental in coalition building.