The Slovenia Times

Pensioner's Party Threatens to Leave Coalition

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Already ahead of the meeting of coalition party leaders, Citizens' List (DL) head Gregor Virant and Erjavec made it clear that their parties disagreed regarding necessary measures.

While the DL opposes new taxes, Erjavec said he would not give in to any proposal for cuts in pensions or annual bonuses for pensioners.

Erjavec refused to speak to the press after the meeting, but he is said to have made it clear he would not take more than one or two more coalition meetings like today's.

Ahead of the meeting, he said the PM should tie any such proposal to a confidence vote, in which case he would vote against. He added that he hoped the coalition was sober enough to seek finances elsewhere.

Virant was the only one to speak to the press after the meeting, but he did not wish to comment on Erjavec's statements and merely announced that PM Alenka Bratušek and Finance Minister Uroš Čufer would present the next package of measures "very shortly".

Coalition partners also discussed staffing in state-owned companies, following the controversial appointment of former State Secretary Gašpar Gašpar Mišič as chairman of port operator Luka Koper on 26 August.

The coalition agreed that the SOD fund, which is currently managing state assets, should have full authority in appointing supervisors and should also take full responsibility for this, Virant explained.

SOD should listen "neither to political parties nor lobbies or anybody else", he stressed, adding that the emerging Slovenia Sovereign Holding would need to follow the same principle.

Commenting on the issue ahead of the meeting, Erjavec said politics would always be involved in staffing and that Gašpar Mišič's appointment was a result of lobbyist staffing rather than political staffing.

He added that staffing should be regulated in a way that will make it transparent and that it will be known "who appointed whom" so that those appointed bear responsibility and that the government has some sort of influence.

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