The president of Slovakia says she will give a mandate to form a new government to the winner of the country's parliamentary elections, signaling former Prime Minister Robert Fico and his SMER-SSD can begin putting together a coalition government in the central European country.
President Zuzana Caputova made the announcement on October 1 after the party, which campaigned on pledges to end military aid to Ukraine, received 22.94 percent of the vote.
With nearly all results counted, the liberal Progressive Slovakia (PS) came in second with 17.96 percent. Five other parties also won seats.
Fico, whose victory signals a further shift in Central Europe against political liberalism, said he was ready to open talks with other parties on forming a coalition government as soon as Caputova asks him.
“We’re here, we’re ready, we’ve learned something, we’re more experienced,” he said.
He said it would take at least two weeks to form the government, which will replace a government that has been backing Kyiv against Russia's invasion.
Fico has said Slovakia would still be prepared to help Ukraine in a humanitarian way and with constructio but would draw the line on continued arms shipments from Slovakia, a member of NATO.
During the campaign, Fico, 59, criticized Slovakia's arms supplies to Ukraine while pledging to stop shipments to Kyiv. He also dismissed further EU sanctions against Russia, questioned the possibility of Ukraine joining NATO, and repeated Kremlin narratives that NATO caused the war.
Fico said Slovakia has bigger problems than the war in Ukraine, including energy prices and living costs, but his party would do everything possible to start peace talks.
Fico's statements criticizing continued arms shipments and insisting that liberalism has been imposed by Brussels mirror those of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who congratulated him on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.
"Guess who's back! Congratulations to Robert Fico on his undisputable victory at the Slovak parliamentary elections. Always good to work together with a patriot. Looking forward to it!" he said.
Fico may look to the moderate leftist HLAS (Voice) party, which came third with nearly 15 percent of votes, as a partner. But SMER-SSD would need a third party in order to govern and may look to the pro-Russian Slovak National Party.
HLAS leader Peter Pellegrini has said ammunition supplies to Ukraine are good for Slovakia's defense industry and the party has backed the EU'sstance against the invasion.
Fico has not clarified whether his party would seek to end commercial supplies from the defense industry.
The liberal PS, which wants to stay the course on backing Ukraine, also plans to court HLAS.
"We believe that this is very bad news for Slovakia," PS leader Michal Simecka told a news conference. "And it would be even worse news if Robert Fico succeeds in forming a government."