Slovakian PM’s tried assassination is warning to UK forward of poisonous election

The bloodstains on a Slovakian street are a warning to Britain. Eight summers since the murder of the British MP Jo Cox, the country’s controversial Prime Minister Robert Fico lies in ­hospital recovering from an ­assassination attempt.

It follows one of the most noxious electoral campaigns in recent history. Mr Fico models himself on his idols Donald Trump, Viktor Orban and even Vladimir Putin. Now, as Britain faces what many fear could be our most toxic election ever, there is still time for us to step back from the brink.

“It is a shock for everyone,” Pavol Ovsonka, 38, tells me, from the bed and breakfast he runs in the High Tatras mountains. “The current government prefers authoritarian policies. This assassination attempt makes things even worse.”

I was matched with Pavol this week by our project Europe Talks – which promotes one-to-one dialogue – his country reeling from political violence.

In the town of Handlova in central Slovakia, a small bloodstain and a bullet hole is the only visible sign left of the drama engulfing a nation. But like the rest of the country, Pavol was struggling to understand the shooting by 71-year-old poet Juraj Cintula.

Pavol admitted that he lives in something of a “bubble” in the High Tatras – a place “of big storms, avalanches and bears”. As if on cue, our conversation was interrupted by a giant storm on the mountain.

Pavol lives just a two-hour drive from the border with Ukraine. While he has sheltered Ukrainian refugees at his guesthouse, and even undertook a dangerous humanitarian mission to Lviv – his Prime Minister has been happy to surf anti-Ukrainian conspiracy theories to power.

“The Ukrainian border is just two hours driving from my home,” Pavol says. “If Russians reach this border, tourism will die here. But a lot of Slovaks believe Russian propaganda. It is so easy for Russian troll farms to manipulate public opinion in Slovakia.”

The other themes of last ­September’s Slovakian elections are worryingly familiar. LGBTQ rights and the “scourge” of refugees. One campaign video by Fico’s Smer-SD party featured liberal PS party leader Michal Simecka wrapped in a rainbow flag pondering which toilet to choose.

“While the progressive Misho (Michal) decides whether he is a boy, a girl or a helicopter today, for us gender ideology is unacceptable in schools and marriage is a unique union between a man and a woman,” a smiling Fico said to camera.

Pavol, who was three when communist Czechoslovakia was ended by the Velvet Revolution, says the Prime Minister has become more extreme over time. “He was always a strong supporter of NATO, EU, open society, but there were corruption scandals,” he says. “So, he chose nationalist policy to attract the simple electorate.”

Prime Minister Fico was shot four times in the stomach and arm at close range as he greeted his supporters in a small former mining town. His Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok has even warned of a possible civil war.

Appeals for unity have been led by the outgoing President Zuzana Caputova, a former environmental campaigner, who has been the victim of toxic attacks by Fico. “The hateful rhetoric we witness leads to hateful acts. Let’s stop it,” she told reporters.

The Mirror has been a partner of My Country Talks – the brainchild of Zeit Online in Germany – since April 2019. For this year’s Europe Talks we were joined by newspapers in 39 countries and 5,000 people taking part in one-to-one chats from across the continent.

And Pavol also had something hopeful to say about dialogue. “The Government is supported by older people, or people with basic education,” he says. “A significant percentage of our population is already abroad, which makes the situation even worse.

“My mother lives with me in the B&B. Before I returned home to run the guesthouse, my mum agreed with Fico too. But now she is against his policies. So, the dialogue between young and old is important. A lot of old people live alone without contact with young ones. They are an easy target for disinformation and conspiracy websites.”

We are now in the biggest election year in history. Over four billion are due to head to the polls – more than half the world ’s population in over 70 countries.

Britain will vote just two weeks after the eighth anniversary of the Brexit referendum which ripped our country apart. The anniversary of Jo’s murder is just three weeks away.

Her sister, the MP Kim Leadbeater told BBC Radio 4’s Broken Politicians, Broken Politics programme last week that: “Politics was in a pretty bad place at that time… Sadly, I would say, if anything, it’s worse.”

In the UK we all now face a decision at the ballot box. But we also face a choice about what kind of country we will be at the end of the next six short weeks.

We must fight for the country we want. But we also need to talk.