SLOVAKIA: Slovakia's controversial former prime minister, Mr Vladimir Meciar, has staged a shock comeback, topping the weekend presidential poll and making the man who once isolated Slovakia from the EU likely to lead the country into the union next month.
Mr Meciar took nearly a third of the vote in Saturday's election and will face a former political ally in a run-off on April 17th. Mr Eduard Kukan, the foreign minister and clear favourite, was eliminated after finishing third.
"It's only half-time, and you don't celebrate at half-time. The elections will continue," said Mr Meciar, who nevertheless was clearly jubilant after hearing the results yesterday.
Mr Meciar will now face Mr Ivan Gasparovic in the second round.Official results gave 22.3 per cent to Mr Gasparovic, a wafer-thin margin of just 0.2 points ahead of Mr Kukan, who led opinion polls before the vote. Analysts said Mr Meciar was very likely to beat Mr Gasparovic in the run-off.
A second weekend vote to recall the government failed, as expected, because of low turnout.
The presidential result, on the other hand, was a complete surprise, after nearly all pre-election opinion polls put Mr Meciar in third place. "This result is absolutely shocking," said Mr Grigory Meseznikov, head of the IVO think-tank. "It will definitely complicate the whole country's situation, especially for the government."
Mr Meciar capitalised on popular discontent with the government's austerity programme and campaigned against the programme with great success, particularly in rural areas.
Although the president in Slovakia is strictly a figurehead, Mr Meciar is expected to use his veto powers to block the reform programme, destabilising the minority administration of Prime Minister Mikulas Dzurinda.
Mr Meciar has always been a love-hate figure in Slovak politics. After the split with the Czech Republic in 1993, opponents accused him of running a totalitarian state and using the secret police to threaten opponents.
His reign in the 1990s was characterised by an openly corrupt privatisation drive and regular nationalistic outbursts that alienated EU, NATO and the US.
Ms Madeleine Albright, the Prague-born former US secretary of state, once memorably described Mr Meciar as the "black hole in the heart of Europe".
Mr Meciar said in interviews last week that he now supported the EU and was a "changed man". He said he made some mistakes during his time as prime minister but said a hard hand was necessary in the post-communist years. However, "dictatorship is not part of my personality", the one-time amateur boxer said.