BRATISLAVA, November 15, (WEBNOVINY) – The Coalition Council, which is to select a joint candidate for the post of the Prosecutor General, will probably meet on Sunday, instead of Saturday, as originally proposed by Prime Minister Iveta Radicova. Parliament should elect the replacement for the incumbent prosecutor General Dobroslav Trnka in a week, next Monday. MOST-HID Chairman Bela Bugar said at a news conference Monday that the coalition representatives will probably met to seek an agreement on Sunday morning. He reasoned the change in date with a meeting of the KDH national council taking place in Trnava on Saturday and the fact that many politicians will spend Saturday in regions with the municipal and communal election campaign.
Bugar also said that the coalition commission, which was tasked to seek an agreement on a joint candidate for the Prosecutor General wound down its activities. “Various negotiations will take place before Sunday,” he added. According to Bugar the coalition wants to find a candidate who would get votes of all four coalition parties. “It is more important to seek a joint candidate than to criticize one party for why it was not able to make an agreement with three other parties. The problem is also that because of some reasons one party cannot or does not want to support the candidate. We prefer looking for options until the last moment. We have to submit the proposals until Monday 6 p.m. Not reaching an agreement would be a bad message,” Bugar said.
Prime Minister Iveta Radicova asked chairmen of the coalition parties to continue talks on the joint nominee and convened a meeting of the Coalition Council for Sunday, November 20, instead of originally planned Monday, November 15. “This creates a sufficient space for further talks with heads of coalition parties as well as with Members of Parliament, who have competence to nominate and elect a new Prosecutor General”, reads a press release of Cabinet’s press and information department.
Last week the representatives of the four coalition parties- SDKU-DS, SaS, KDH and Most-Hid met a couple of times but they have not yet reached an agreement on a joint candidate. The number of the candidates has narrowed to two: SDKU-DS still supports the Special Prosecutor Jan Hrivnak, who was already nominated in the first, failed election. According to the media its three partners support the Prosecutor of the General Prosecutor Office Jozef Kandera. Kandera is the former Supreme Court justice; he was one of the critics of the court’s president Stefan Harabin.
SITA