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Slovakia’s Fico plots to dismantle the free press

Journalists warn new populist prime minister is trying to sideline those in the media he disagrees with.

In Slovakia, Robert Fico’s government has shunned the independent press and wants to remake the public broadcaster into a state-run TV channel that could soon be run by a flat-earther.

The government’s goal? Bring the media to heel.

Since winning a Sept. 30 general election, Fico and his coalition allies have dismayed Brussels by seeming to lurch toward the governance style of Hungary’s strongman prime minister, Viktor Orbán, including by abolishing a key anti-corruption office, halting state military support to Ukraine, parroting Moscow talking points, and now attempting to subjugate public media in an attempt to give the coalition even greater control. That’s triggered concerns in Brussels about media freedom and civil liberties in another European Union country.

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Fico’s government on April 24 approved a controversial proposal to scrap public broadcaster RTVS and replace it with what free-speech advocates fear could be a mouthpiece for the ruling coalition.

“We can say goodbye to any type of public service, objectivity … we are really heading to the point where [STVR] will become [the] government’s mouthpiece, maybe even propaganda tool,” said political scientist Peter Dubóczi, who is also a media expert with Adapt Institute, a think tank.

Shortly after beginning his fourth term as prime minister last fall, Fico and his government ceased communicating with four respected independent media outlets that he deemed “hostile,” including TV Markíza — the nation’s most-watched station, with a 27 percent market share — as well as the dailies Denník N and SME and the news site Aktuality.

In 2018, investigative journalist Ján Kuciak and his fiancée Martina Kušnírová were murdered, sparking the largest protests in the country since the 1989 fall of the Communist regime and leading to Fico’s resignation as PM, mid-way through his third term.

Under the authoritarian 1994-1998 Mečiar government, which saw Slovakia dropped from a round of NATO expansion due to democratic backsliding, multiple journalists were attacked and independent media were subjected to intimidation and economic pressure.

Zuzana Petková, a former business journalist and current director of the Zastavme korupciu (Stop Corruption) NGO, said she has learned to live with the “constant hatred and vile comments” that are aimed at her.

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