Ivan Gašparovic
Encyclopedia
Slovakia
The Slovak Republic is a landlocked state in Central Europe. It has a population of over five million and an area of about . Slovakia is bordered by the Czech Republic and Austria to the west, Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east and Hungary to the south...
politician and law professor who has been the President of Slovakia
President of Slovakia
The President of Slovakia is the head of state of Slovakia. The President is directly elected by the people for five years, and can be elected for a maximum of two consecutive terms. The presidency is largely a ceremonial office, but the President does exercise certain limited powers with absolute...
since 15 June 2004. He is also the first Slovak president to be re-elected.
Biography
Gašparovič was born in PoltárPoltár
Poltár is a town and municipality in the Poltár District in the Banská Bystrica Region of Slovakia.-Geography:The town is located in the Southern Slovak basin near the river Ipeľ, south of the Revúcka Hills, which is part of the Slovak Ore Mountains, around from Lučenec.It is home to a small...
, near Lučenec
Lucenec
Lučenec is a town in the Banská Bystrica Region of south-central Slovakia. Historically, it was part, and in the 18th century the capital, of the Nógrád county of the Kingdom of Hungary. In 1918, as a result of the Treaty of Trianon, it became a part of Czechoslovakia...
and Banská Bystrica
Banská Bystrica
Banská Bystrica is a key city in central Slovakia located on the Hron River in a long and wide valley encircled by the mountain chains of the Low Tatras, the Veľká Fatra, and the Kremnica Mountains. With 81,281 inhabitants, Banská Bystrica is the sixth most populous municipality in Slovakia...
in present day south-central Slovakia, that time in the first Slovak Republic. His father, Vladimir Gašparović, emigrated to Slovakia from Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
at the end of World War I and was a teacher at a (secondary school) in Bratislava
Bratislava
Bratislava is the capital of Slovakia and, with a population of about 431,000, also the country's largest city. Bratislava is in southwestern Slovakia on both banks of the Danube River. Bordering Austria and Hungary, it is the only national capital that borders two independent countries.Bratislava...
, and at one point its Headmaster.
Gašparovič studied at the Law Faculty of the Comenius University in Bratislava, which is the main university in Slovakia, from 1959 to 1964. He worked in the District Prosecutor's Office of the district of Martin
Martin, Slovakia
Martin is a city in northern Slovakia, situated on the Turiec river, between the Malá Fatra and Veľká Fatra mountains, near the city of Žilina. The population numbers approximately 58,000, which makes it the eighth largest city in Slovakia...
(1965–66), then became a Prosecutor
Prosecutor
The prosecutor is the chief legal representative of the prosecution in countries with either the common law adversarial system, or the civil law inquisitorial system...
at the Municipal Prosecutor's Office of Bratislava (1966–68). In 1968, he joined the Communist Party of Slovakia
Communist Party of Slovakia (1939)
The Communist Party of Slovakia was a communist party in Slovakia. It was formed in March 1939, when the Slovak Republic was created, as the Slovak branches of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia were separated from the mother party...
, supposedly to support Alexander Dubček
Alexander Dubcek
Alexander Dubček , also known as Dikita, was a Slovak politician and briefly leader of Czechoslovakia , famous for his attempt to reform the communist regime during the Prague Spring...
's reforms, but he was expelled from the party after the Warsaw Pact
Warsaw Pact
The Warsaw Treaty Organization of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance , or more commonly referred to as the Warsaw Pact, was a mutual defense treaty subscribed to by eight communist states in Eastern Europe...
invasion in Czechoslovakia in August 1968 (see History of Czechoslovakia
History of Czechoslovakia
With the collapse of the Habsburg monarchy at the end of World War I, the independent country of Czechoslovakia was formed, encouraged by, among others, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson...
).
Early career
However, in spite of his expulsion, Gašparovič was able to continue his legal career and from 1968 to July 1990, he was a teacher at the Department of Criminal Law, Criminology and Criminological Practice at the Law Faculty of the Comenius University in Bratislava. In February 1990, he became the prorector (deputy vice-chancellor) of Comenius University.After the Velvet Revolution
Velvet Revolution
The Velvet Revolution or Gentle Revolution was a non-violent revolution in Czechoslovakia that took place from November 17 – December 29, 1989...
and the subsequent fall of the Communist regime, Gašparovič was chosen by the newly elected democratic president Václav Havel
Václav Havel
Václav Havel is a Czech playwright, essayist, poet, dissident and politician. He was the tenth and last President of Czechoslovakia and the first President of the Czech Republic . He has written over twenty plays and numerous non-fiction works, translated internationally...
to become the country's federal Prosecutor-General. After March 1992, he was briefly the Vice-President of the Legislative Council of Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
, before the federal Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
split into two independent states in January 1993. Gašparovič temporarily returned to the Comenius University Law Faculty. He was a member of the Scientific Council of the Comenius University and of the Scientific Council of the Law Faculty of the same university. In late 1992, he was one of the authors of the Constitution of Slovakia
Constitution of Slovakia
The Constitution of Slovakia, officially Constitution of the Slovak Republic is the current constitution of Slovakia. It was passed by the Slovak National Council on 1 September 1992 and signed on 3 September 1992 in the Knights Hall of the Bratislava Castle...
.
In 1992 Gašparovič joined the Movement for a Democratic Slovakia (HZDS, Hnutie za demokratické Slovensko), led by the controversial Vladimír Mečiar
Vladimír Meciar
Vladimír Mečiar is a Slovak politician who was Prime Minister of Slovakia from 1990 to 1991, from 1992 to 1994, and from 1994 to 1998. He is the leader of the People's Party - Movement for a Democratic Slovakia...
. Gašparovič was one of the central figures of Prime Minister Mečiar's administration that was generally perceived as authoritarian . He became Speaker of the National Council of the Slovak Republic (NRSR) after the victory of the HZDS in the June 1992 elections. When a scandal erupted over the discovery of microphones in the U.S. Consulate in November 1992, Gašparovič was asked by Mečiar to head a commission to investigate the background of the affair, but the results were inconclusive. Later that year, when Mečiar's government attempted to close down opposition-led Trnava University, Gašparovič sided with the Prime Minister, echoing his argument that its opening was "illegal." The West viewed the regime as untrustworthy, and the country was excluded from the EU and NATO expansion talks that went on at the time at the neighbouring central European countries.
The period of the HZDS rule was among other things marked by persistent animosity between the HZDS-led government and the country's President Michal Kováč
Michal Kovác
Michal Kováč was a Slovak politician in the early 1990s and the first President of Slovakia after the creation of that state from 1993 to 1998....
, a vocal opponent of the Mečiar regime. The conflict had gotten to the point where the Slovak Secret Service SIS
Slovenská informacná služba
Slovenská informačná služba is an intelligence agency of the government of Slovakia.- History :Slovenská informačná služba was established on January 21, 1993 as a descendant of the Federálna bezpečnostná informačná služba FBIS...
was alleged to have kidnapped the president's son, Michal Jr., plying him with alcohol, and dropping him in front of a police station in nearby Hainburg
Hainburg
Hainburg may refer to the following places:* Hainburg an der Donau, Lower Austria, Austria* Hainburg, Germany, Hesse, Germany...
in Austria, a country where he was wanted on suspicion of financial fraud.
A part of this continuous feud was Gašparovič's widely publicized derogatory comment made in reference to President Kováč not being aware that the parliamentary microphone was on, calling Kováč "an old dick"{starého chuja}.
From October 1998 to 15 July 2002, when his HZDS was an opposition party, Gašparovič was a member of the parliamentary Committee for the Supervision of the SIS
Slovenská informacná služba
Slovenská informačná služba is an intelligence agency of the government of Slovakia.- History :Slovenská informačná služba was established on January 21, 1993 as a descendant of the Federálna bezpečnostná informačná služba FBIS...
(the Slovak equivalent of CIA). He was also a member of the delegation of the Slovak parliament in the Interparliamentary Union.
In July 2002 after four years in opposition Gašparovič left the HZDS after Mečiar decided not to include him and some other HZDS members on the ballot for the upcoming elections. Gašparovič along with the other members immediately (on 12 July) founded a new party, the Hnutie za demokraciu (HZD) Movement for Democracy
Movement for Democracy (Slovakia)
The Movement for Democracy is a political party in Slovakia split from the Movement for a Democratic Slovakia in 2002. The first leader of the party was Ivan Gašparovič, the current president of Slovakia...
, a name bearing a close resemblance to his former HZDS. The cited reasons for the departure were internal disputes within the party, or as Gašparovič put it in an interview with The Slovak Spectator
The Slovak Spectator
The Slovak Spectator is Slovakia's only English-language newspaper.It is published weekly by The Rock, s.r.o. publishing house and covers local news, culture and business...
, "differences of opinion with HZDS leader [Vladimír] Mečiar, mostly about the leadership of the party." In the September 2002 elections his party polled 3.3 percent, not enough to win seats in the parliament. After the elections, Gašparovič returned to the Law Faculty of the Comenius University, and wrote several university textbooks as well as working papers and studies on criminal law.
In April 2004 Gašparovič decided to run for the presidency against Vladimír Mečiar
Vladimír Meciar
Vladimír Mečiar is a Slovak politician who was Prime Minister of Slovakia from 1990 to 1991, from 1992 to 1994, and from 1994 to 1998. He is the leader of the People's Party - Movement for a Democratic Slovakia...
and the then governing coalition's candidate Eduard Kukan
Eduard Kukan
Eduard Kukan served as Minister of Foreign Affairs of Slovakia from 1998 to 2006. He was a candidate in the presidential election held on 3 April 2004, and although pre-election polls had suggested he would come in first, he actually came in third behind former prime minister Vladimír Mečiar and...
. In an unexpected turn of events, the perceived underdog Gašparovič received the second highest number of votes and moved on to the second round, once again facing Mečiar. The main factor for Gašparovič's first round success was the low turnout of the front-runner Kukan's electorate, as Kukan was generally considered to be a sure bet for the second round. In other words, the majority of the population viewed the first round as a formality, and was saving their effort for the second round to keep Mečiar at bay. Hence in the second round the (potential) Eduard Kukan voters faced an uneasy choice between two representatives of the past regime. Ultimately, Gašparovič, regarded by Mečiar opponents as the "lesser evil", was elected as the president (see Slovakia presidential election, 2004).
President of Slovakia
Gašparovič's toned down and non-confrontational approach to presidency has increased his popularity with many voters, and he is a generally popular president now. However, to date he has remained unapologetic about his role in the Mečiar's regime, which is generally perceived to have set back Slovakia's post-communist political and economic progress and development. Gašparovič was supported by the Direction – Social Democracy of Prime Minister Robert FicoRobert Fico
Robert Fico served as the Prime Minister of Slovakia from July 4, 2006 to July 8, 2010.He is the leader of the left-wing party Direction – Social Democracy . The party won the parliamentary elections in 2006, receiving approximately 30 percent of the cast votes...
and the Slovak National Party a nationalist and populist party led by Jan Slota
Ján Slota
Ján Slota is the co-founder and President of the Slovak National Party, an extremist nationalist party. Slota as the leader of SNS entered into a coalition with Robert Fico's Smer in 2006...
.
Controversies
In an 23 August statement Gašparovič opposed erecting a sculpture in János EsterházyJános Esterházy
Count János Esterházy a member of the House of Esterházy was the most prominent ethnic Hungarian politician in former Czechoslovakia...
’s memory in Kosice
Košice
Košice is a city in eastern Slovakia. It is situated on the river Hornád at the eastern reaches of the Slovak Ore Mountains, near the border with Hungary...
, saying that the one-time deputy had been a follower of Hitler and fascism. He also opposed Ferdinand Ďurčanský
Ferdinand Durcanský
Doctor Ferdinand Ďurčanský was a Slovak nationalist leader who for a time served with the collaborationist government of Jozef Tiso.-Nationalism:...
's sculpture in that case. The president said the Hungarian ethnic politician and martyr was a supporter of Nazism
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
. In fact Esterházy had been the only member of the Slovak parliament
National Council of the Slovak Republic
The National Council of the Slovak Republic , abbreviated to NR SR, is the national parliament of Slovakia. It is unicameral, and consists of 150 MPs, who are elected by universal suffrage under proportional representation every four years....
to vote against anti-Jewish laws in 1942. The one-time deputy had always rejected both fascism and communism, suffered in the Gulag and died in a Moravian prison in 1957.
Hungary’s Foreign Ministry the next day rejected Slovak President Ivan Gasparovic’s statement and said that the ideology reflected in the statement did not contribute to the development of bilateral relations. The ministry “notes with regret and incomprehension” that issues surrounding the martyred count are in the focus of daily Slovak politics, the ministry said. The achievements of Esterházy are recognised in many countries including Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
, the statement noted. Marek Trubac, the Slovak president’s spokesman, told MTI
MTI
MTI may stand for:* MTI, Message Type Indicator.* MTI Consulting, a consulting firm based in Bahrain.* MTI Consultancy, Machwuerth Team International Group, a consultancy based in Germany.* Magyar Távirati Iroda, a Hungarian news wire agency....
that Esterházy is considered a war criminal in Slovakia, “for supporting fascist ideology”. Though Esterházy did vote against the anti-Jewish bills, he also welcomed (former Hungarian regent) Horthy’s “fascist troops” that occupied Kosice, the spokesman added.
Hungarian Deputy Prime Minister Zsolt Semjén
Zsolt Semjén
Zsolt Semjén is a Hungarian politician, currently minister without portfolio and Deputy Prime Minister in the second cabinet of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán...
said he was appalled by Gasparovic’s statement. He said that Esterházy “heroically exercised the virtues” and was all along committed to the teachings of the Catholic Church, so it is not by chance that his beatification
Beatification
Beatification is a recognition accorded by the Catholic Church of a dead person's entrance into Heaven and capacity to intercede on behalf of individuals who pray in his or her name . Beatification is the third of the four steps in the canonization process...
is under way. Semjén called the attack on Esterházy’s memory an insult to the Hungarian nation and the Catholic Church and a violation of universal human rights.
Hungarian President Pál Schmitt
Pál Schmitt
Pál Schmitt is the current President of Hungary. He was elected President of Hungary in a 263 to 59 vote in the Parliament of Hungary and was sworn in on 2010....
said "it is unacceptable that János Esterházy, this true democrat and humanist, still qualifies as a war criminal in Slovakia". The president noted that the Hungarian government and his predecessors had repeatedly initiated Esterházy’s rehabilitation. Schmitt closed the letter with the hope that his forthcoming meeting with Gašparovič in Budapest would focus on the two countries’ common values.
Private life
In 1964, Gašparovič married Silvia BeníkováSilvia Gašparovicová
Silvia Gašparovičová née Beníková is the current first lady of Slovakia, wife of Ivan Gašparovič.Gašparovičová attended the Slovak Technical University from 1960 until 1965 where she studied civil engineering and also from 1971 to 1973 she studied economical law at Comenius University...
, with whom he has two children. His favorite sport is American basketball. He loves Korean cars and takes his children to McDonald's.
Honours and awards
- Order Orła Białego 21 February 2009 (Poland)
- Knight Grand Cross decorated with Grand Cordon of the Order of Merit of the Italian RepublicOrder of Merit of the Italian RepublicThe Order of Merit of the Italian Republic was founded as the senior order of knighthood by the second President of the Italian Republic, Luigi Einaudi in 1951...
(20 February 2007) - Knight Grand Cross of the Grand Order of King TomislavGrand Order of King TomislavThe Grand Order of King Tomislav , or more fully the Grand Order of King Tomislav with Sash and Great Morning Star , is the highest state order of the Republic of Croatia...
("For outstanding contribution to the promotion of friendship and development co-operation between the Republic of Croatia and the Slovak Republic." – 27 October 2008) - Collar of the Order of the Cross of Terra MarianaOrder of the Cross of Terra MarianaThe Order of the Cross of Terra Mariana was instituted in 1995 to honour the independence of the Estonian state. The Order of the Cross of Terra Mariana is bestowed upon the President of the Republic. Presidents of the Republic who have ceased to hold office shall keep the Order of the Cross of...
(Estonia)
See also
- List of political parties in Slovakia
- List of Presidents of Slovakia
- List of leaders of Slovak parliaments
- Slovakia presidential election, 2004
- Silvia GašparovičováSilvia GašparovicováSilvia Gašparovičová née Beníková is the current first lady of Slovakia, wife of Ivan Gašparovič.Gašparovičová attended the Slovak Technical University from 1960 until 1965 where she studied civil engineering and also from 1971 to 1973 she studied economical law at Comenius University...
External links
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