Overview of the week's top stories
since 10 November 2002

Voters hit the polls on Sunday to vote in presidential and local elections across Slovenia. None of the nine candidates managed to win the presidential race outright, and so Janez Drnovšek will face off against Barbara Brezigar in a second round on 1 December.

On Sunday, Drnovšek told 24ur.com that the result is a good foundation for the second round and "that there are several real reasons to be optimistic." Brezigar called on those voters who "perhaps did not vote or whose candidate today did not succeed, to participate in the 1 December election and to vote for beautiful and pleasant Slovenia."

Voter turnout was average, around 72 percent. 24ur.com reported that the highest turnout rate was recorded in Kranj, 74.31 percent. The lowest was reported in Maribor, 62.47 percent. In the country’s first general election in 1992, voter turnout peaked at 80 percent. General elections in 1996 had a turnout rate of about 74 percent. For the October 2000 elections, that number dropped to 70.4 percent. Local elections have much lower rates: in 1994, 60 percent in the first round and 50 percent in the second; in 1998, 55 percent.

The sixth, Trebnje, allowed the election of a Romany councilor even though the town has not changed its statute to allow this yet. It is possible that special elections for Roma representatives in the other five towns could be called in the near future.

Significant irregularities were recorded only in Novo Mesto. The biggest violation was the fact that a number of people cast ballots who were not actual residents of Novo Mesto. The election was so close that those votes were deciding, and so the entire election will be redone on 1 December.

When a parody of the song "Samo Ljubezen" (Only Love) by the trio Sestre was published on the last page of the magazine Maturant&ka last week, NGOs led by Mirovni Inštitut and the Škuc group protested immediately. They believe that the text, retitled "Samo Bolezen" (Only Illness), is pure hate speech directed at homosexuals.

Maturant&ka is published by Delo and Gyrus and supported by the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport. The magazine has a print run of 60,000 copies and is provided free of charge to school students. Civil society leaders called on the ministry to immediately cease its financing of the magazine and to publicly denounce the poem.

On Monday, the ministry responded, demanding that the publisher print a public apology in the next issue of the magazine. If editor Gorazd Suhadolnik does not, the ministry promises to withdraw all financial support.

Two days later, the protest was joined by the Women’s Forum of the ZLSD, which believes the poem "strongly encroaches on the equal and non-discriminatory treatment of the rights of the same-sex oriented."

The government decided to send the equipment at its session on 5 September. The manifest of the shipment includes some 1800 rifles, 88 mortars, 26 anti-tank hand grenades and related ammunition. The ministry reports that the transfer of arms to the Afghanistani government was conducted according to international conventions and standards.

On Monday, representatives of the Slovene minority in Trst (Trieste) publicly warned of a rise in political tension tied to the debate over the execution of the Law on the Global Protection of the Slovene Minority in Italy and the Italian and Slovene communities’ stances on the tumultuous events of World War Two.

President of the Council of Slovene Organizations Sergij Pahor said that the current situation is the result of a plan which aims at preventing the execution of the Law on the Protection of Slovenes in Italy, which was passed last year.

President of the Committee for Honoring the Bazoviške Heroes, Milan Pahor, said that right-wing parties in Italy are also infringing on the Slovene community’s right to honor the Bazoviške Heroes, the Slovenes living in Italy who rebelled against the fascist regime during World War Two.

Leaders of the local Slovene community called the increasing tension and intolerance an attempt to "fascist-ize" Trst. They warned that if local leaders do not act to defuse the situation, they will bring the case to the national and international level.

The 1911 Austro-Hungarian census showed that almost 30 percent of the population of the city of Trst was Slovene, while almost 95 percent of the rural areas surrounding the city were inhabited by Slovenes. At this time, Trst was home to the largest urban Slovene community in the world, ahead of both Ljubljana and Cleveland (in the United States), the second and third largest. Trst became part of Italy in 1954. Today, Slovenes number 49,000 out of Trst’s total population of 300,000.

On Thursday, Dolenjski List published a feature about the Narodni Dom (National Home) in Novo Mesto, which reopened to the public on 6 November. The Narodni Dom had fallen into severe disrepair, but has now been completely renovated.

Novo Mesto mayor Dr. Anton Starec and president of the Novo Mesto Society Anton Škerelj both spoke at the grand opening, expressing the hope that the renovation is just the first step towards returning the Narodni Dom to its rightful place as the hub of Slovene culture in not only Novo Mesto but in the wider Dolenjska region.

The Novo Mesto Narodni Dom is the oldest in all of Slovenia, established in 1872 by the local Slovene reading room, which had met in pubs throughout Novo Mesto prior to the construction of the building. Construction began in 1873. The building first opened to the public in November 1875, though construction continued for another decade.

Most Slovene towns established their own Narodni Dom around the turn of the century. One was built in Ljubljana in 1896, in Celje in 1897, in Maribor in 1899 and in Trst in 1904.

In 1925, the Sokols purchased the Narodni Dom, and after World War II, it was used by the Yugoslav army (JLA) as a cinema and an officers’ mess hall. After a JLA Dom was built, the building was used by the Dolenjska Project Bureau and later the Institute for the Protection of Nature and Cultural Heritage as a conservation workshop.

In 1992, the building was declared a cultural monument of local significance and was vacated. It has remained empty for a decade and fell into such disrepair that falling portions of the building’s façade were a danger to passers-by. The Novo Mesto Society started the drive for its renovation. In 1997, ownership of the building was transferred from the Novo Mesto Roads Enterprise to the city of Novo Mesto, and renovations began shortly thereafter.

Highlights of this year’s festival include hometown favorite Hanna Slak’s first feature, Slepa pega (Blind Spot, Slovenia, 2001), as well as Sergej Bodrov’s Sestry (Sisters, Russia, 2001), Joel Zwick’s My Big Fat Greek Wedding (US, 2002) and François Ozon’s 8 Femmes (8 Women, France, 2002).

Among the festival’s sections are Perspectives, featuring independently produced films by first- or second-time directors; Horizons, featuring international art-house films; South by Southeast, a regional program; Focus, featuring contemporary British film; Against the Wind, featuring experimental films; New Films from Japan; and a program of short films.

The festival has two major awards: the Kingfisher, and the Golden Reel. The Kingfisher is awarded by a jury to the director of the best film of the Perspectives section directors. The award is worth 5000 Euro. The Golden Reel is awarded by the public to the best film in the Horizons section. The film which wins the Golden Reel is purchased for Slovene distribution. The award ceremony will be held on 24 November.