Overview of the week's top stories
since 12 January 2002

An unidentified woman is suing Head of Police Marko Pogorevc, accusing him of raping her near Novo Mesto in 1992. She alleges that Pogorevc raped her in a car on the way from Suhor to Novo Mesto. The woman currently lives abroad, and told Mladina that the rape was a major factor in her decision to leave the country. Exactly why it took a decade for the suit to be filed is still not clear.

Mladina confirmed with the state prosecutor's office in Ljubljana that the suit was indeed filed last month, though it is not under that office's jurisdiction. The file has been transferred to the state prosecutor's office in Novo Mesto. General State Prosecutor Zdenka Cerar told Mladina that "the proper state prosecutor's office is looking into the matter and will do all that is necessary within its mandates."

SDS leader Janez Janša was the first to speak out in defense of Pogorevc, at a press conference on Thursday. He called the allegations "absurd" and "an underestimation of the political culture and healthy minds of Slovenes."

On Wednesday, the National Assembly staged the first real public debate about the pros and cons of NATO membership. Speaker of Parliament Borut Pahor gave the opening speech, and was followed by a string of leading politicians. Representatives of civil society were only allowed to speak 3 hours into the meeting.

However, the public remains unconvinced of the need for NATO membership. A government poll in December showed 53.2 percent supported membership, which was a two-percent drop since October. At the same time, the number opposed to membership rose four percent to 27.5.

Prime Minister Drnovšek said that the decline is only a reflection of the disappointment that Slovenia was not invited to join NATO sooner.

"Who are the politicians representing? Who did we the voters elect?" Crnkovič asks.

Slovenia's first census is scheduled to run from 1 to 15 April, but two petitions to the Constitutional Court may lead to yet another postponement. The census was deferred from March 2001 due to budgetary problems - the entire exercise is expected to cost upwards of SIT 4 billion (USD 17 million).

The petitions concern whether the census’s questions dealing with national affiliation and religion violate the Constitution. At issue is, essentially, if freedom of religion is enshrined in the Constitution and all people - regardless of nationality - are equal before the law, does the state have the right to ask such questions on the census?

The Constitutional Court held a public review of the petitions on Thursday. Former Constitutional Court Justice Matevž Krivic, who filed the second petition, was there to defend his allegations. Defending the census were representatives of the National Assembly Maksimiljan Lavrinc and Tina Bitenc Pengov, as well as Tomaž Banovec as the joint representative of the government and the statistical office.

The Law on the Census states that it is up to the respondent to decide whether he will answer the questions about nationality and religion, and the census forms must say so outright. Krivic does not think this is enough. He would like to see the appropriate excerpts of the Constitution justifying this printed on the forms as well.

Krivic believes that if the responses are voluntary, statistics based on them will only show the number of people who are prepared to answer the question. Further, the question asks for the respondent's "faith," which can at times be blurry. He believes it would be better to ask a more concrete question, such as formal membership in a religious organization.

Questions about nationality, according to Krivic, are less controversial. There are sufficient objective determiners that could be used instead, e.g., "mother tongue" or "ethnic origin." The Constitutional Court must determine whether the questions on nationality are based on (unacceptable) subjective or (acceptable) objective criteria.

Assuming it does go on as planned, this will be the first census since Slovenia's independence in July 1991, and the sixth since the end of World War Two. Owing to the deferral from March 2001, it is also the first since 1961 that was not carried out as planned. The last census of the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia was conducted in the spring of 1991.

Rumors about a new daily newspaper entering the already saturated market are untrue, at least for now. What is true is that the Delo publishing house would like to unite five local newspapers - Primorske Novice, Gorenjski Glas, Celje's Novi Tednik, Dolenjski List and Radio Tednik Ptuj - into a single daily. A spokesman for Delo told Finance this week that information about the plan hit the public too soon, before enough details had been worked out.

The plan has been presented to the heads of all five papers, and envisions a new daily prepared by a joint editorial staff led by Tit Doberšek, currently an advisor to Delo. The technical side of the move would be the easiest part, since all five newspapers are printed at Delo's print shop.

However, as Marko Valjavec, director of Gorenjski Glas, told STA, "My opinion is that six different newspapers and six different interests are not easily fused."

The only real progress the plan has made is that a letter of intent has been drawn up and distributed to the heads of all five papers. As of yet, none of the five papers have signed it.

Barbara Verdnik director of Primorske Novice, told Finance that her paper staunchly wants to hold on to its independence in both business and editorial matters. "Until those questions are resolved, Primorske Novice will not sign the letter."

She also said that her paper might need up to five years to prepare to go daily. Valjavec's Gorenjski Glas is similarly unprepared to go daily this year. He told STA that while he likes Delo's proposal, several outstanding issues, especially regarding joint distribution and sales, must be resolved first.

Director of Dolenjski List Drago Rustja believes that his paper would need at least two years to be ready to go daily.

There have been several attempts to found new dailies in Slovenia, but so far only Slovenske Novice and Finance have been successful. In June 1991, a daily called Slovenec hit newsstands but could only hold out until November 1996; Republika published from 1992 until 1996; and Jutranjik lasted only for the month of June 1998.

• Janez Podobnik passed his first hurdle this week on the way to being named Minister for European Affairs. On Thursday, the parliament's Committee for Foreign Affairs approved the nomination with a vote of 15:0 and the Commission for European Affairs did likewise, 5:1. Prime Minister Drnovšek has proposed Podobnik for job the with the recent announcement of Igor Bavcar's resignation. For the past several years, Podobnik has led the Slovene negotiating team at Brussels, and is considered the best candidate for the job.

• The executive committee of the NSi decided last Thursday to back the presidential candidacy of High Court Prosecutor Barbara Brezigar. Several other NSi candidates did not gain sufficient support, including party leaders Andrej Bajuk and Lojze Peterle. The NSi will participate in the presidential elections together with the Social Democrats, who announced their support for Brezigar last week. However, Brezigar will not run under the banner of either party. As Janša told STA, "Brezigar is not a candidate of the parties, we are only giving her our support and the decision that we will not run candidates against her."