The Slovenia Times

New Central Bank Governor

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Jazbec was promised support by all deputy groups except the Social Democrats (SD), who said they did not share his views on fixing Slovenia's ailing banking system and restarting the economy.

The majority of deputy groups meanwhile hailed his nomination as injecting a breath of fresh air and a high degree of expertise to the central bank.

In his first statement after the vote, the 43-year-old Jazbec reiterated the position that Slovenia can solve its problems without needing to ask for international aid.

"The measures which the previous government implemented and the current government is pushing ahead with are a guarantee that a bailout will not be needed," he said as he attended a reception with President Borut Pahor.

Highlighting the need to establish an efficient banking system as a means of restoring economic growth, Jazbec said "the crisis is an opportunity to ditch bad practices in managing state assets".

Pointing out that Slovenia is not the only country to be affected by the crisis, he assessed that other countries had been more effective in dealing with it than Slovenia.

Jazbec was nominated by Pahor after he was pledged overwhelming support by parliamentary parties in March.

Presenting the nomination to MPs today, Pahor's chief of staff Nataša Kovač said that Jazbec will bring new approaches to Banka Slovenije.

The nomination prompted a rare display of bipartisanship in parliament, with parties on both sides of the aisle quick to hail Jazbec as an accomplished candidate whose knowledge can help Slovenia deal with the crisis.

Jože Tanko of the Democrats (SDS) said the opposition party hoped that the new governor would do everything in his power to help the banking system clean its balance sheets while also working to establish culpability for bad loans.

The coalition Positive Slovenia's (PS) Jani Mödernoderfer meanwhile hailed the bipartisan show of support for Jazbec, saying he hoped that expertise rather than party colours would continue to prevail as the main criterion for appointing people to top positions in the country.

Jazbec had bid for the position of central bank governor already in 2007, but was overlooked by former President Janez Drnovšek.

A monetary policy specialist, Jazbec graduated from the Ljubljana Faculty of Economics and then obtained his masters from the European University in Prague and doctorate at the Institute of Advanced Studies in Vienna.

After a short stints at the World Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, Jazbec sat on the board of governors of Banka Slovenije between 2003 and 2008, when he resigned over differences in views with other members.

The daily Dnevnik quotes him as explaining his decision by saying that the monetary and exchange rate policies led in the period before Slovenia entered the euro had contributed to Slovenian banks becoming dependent on foreign sources of financing.

He subsequently joined the IMF, serving as an adviser to the central bank of Kosovo and to the governor of the central bank of Suriname.

According to Dnevnik, Jazbec has in the past advocated privatisation of state-owned banks and companies and a need to establish the bad bank for fixing Slovenia's banking system.

A member of the younger generation of Slovenian economists, he was active in the Slovenian Macroeconomic Forum together with the likes of Mićo Mrkaić, Jože P. Damijan, Igor Masten, Sašo Polanec and former Finance Minister Janez Šušteršič.
 

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