Organization: CSAV UTIA
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.slovak-l
Date:         Tue, 12 Jan 1993 08:20:26 EDT
From:         Richard Budd <BUDD@CSPGAS11.BITNET>
Subject:      Report from E. Slovakia - January 1, 1993

To the readers of SLOVAK and MIDEUR discussion groups

Kral'ovsky Chlmec, Slovakia, January 1, 1993

Today is the first day of the second Slovak Republic.  I heard on
the news there were 100,000 people celebrating when the Slovak
were both Slovaks and Hungarians at the party, everybody spoke
Hungarian or, at times, English for the benefit of the "American
in Chlmec".

At half-past midnight, we took to the street to go to another
party, singing New Year's greetings in Hungarian.  As I found out
today listening and having translated a news conference Meciar
and his Cabinent gave today, special considerations given the
Hungarians by the CSFR, will remain unchanged under the new
constitution.

I could see from the news conference that Meciar was trying to
reassure everybody that nothing would change under an independent
Slovakia: privitization, freedom to travel, the country's borders
or relations with its neighbors, or civil rights.  However, my
impression is that Meciar is setting up the Hungarians against
the event that the economy collapses when the Klaus government
cuts Slovakia off from the Czech Republic economy.  In several
instances, his nationalism showed through, especially in
references to the Gabickovo dam.  He mentioned in an answer to
one of the reporters' questions that a person from abroad would
know he was in Slovakia if he were anywhere around Gabickovo.

A disclaimer here.  I saw the news conference in a Hungarian home
(which is also where I am writing this article) and a 17 year old
Hungarian translated for me.  By the way, he and I are arranging
for him to go to school next year in the United States, partially
because of expected conditions in Slovakia, but mostly because
that is his desire, and he is working hard to achieve it.

The only visible signs of the change that has taken place
overnight is that the F1 Federal Channel is gone as are the
Federal radio stations (the movie, The Magnificent Seven with
Steve McQueen and Yul Brynner was the last thing I saw on F1
before I left for the party), a few white-blue-red Slovakian
flags at public buildings, and 'CS' tags scrapped off many of the
cars that passed me along the road.  The quality of programming
on television has declined significantly, but then today is a
holiday and I always felt television in the United States was
crapping the bottom of the barrel on holidays too outside of
their specials.  My own impression is that the changes will
become better known in the next six months, especially when the
Slovak economy starts standing on its own.

My own belief is that Meciar is not an evil man, but a naive
one.  He has a dream of an independent Slovak nation that he has
now realized, but really no clue of where to take it from there.
The problems for him are threefold.  The first is to improve the
economic condition of the country.  He promised in the news
conference not to escalate weapons productions and admitted the
arms industry could not improve the economy.  He does not appear
to have an economic program other than keeping the status quo
(George Frajkor could enlighten me here) so I am pessimistic
about the economic future here.  It's not so easy to dismiss the
need to compete with the West as the need for the Czechs.

His second problem is that Meciar is trapped in his own doctrine.
Whether he is a nationalist, or just an opportunist, his
popularity depends on wrapping himself in the Slovak flag unless
he can improve the economy.  This is hardly encouraging for any
body with an education, much less any of the minorities.

The third problem is his neighbors.  Meciar preaches close
relations with the Czech Republic, but I hardly believe Klaus is
going to subsidize the country to any degree that the CSFR did.
I get the feeling that Meciar will make the country think there
is a threat from Budapest.  My fear is that he will associate
himself with Iliescu in Romania and Milesovic in Yugoslavia,
hardly the bedfellows that would encourage investment or
confidence in a new Slovak nation.

Central Europe is entering a new period of instability, I am
afraid.  This is not encouraging for either the European
Community or the United States.  Readers of my previous
dispatches already know that I believe the answer is a central
European federation of the Czech and Slovak states, Hungary,
Austria, Slovenia, and Croatia.  What the EC and US should
consider doing is develop incentives for these six countries to
join together in a superstate, but I am not sanguine about that
at all.

                                       Richard Budd
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.slovak-l