title: Why I Am Running type: Article language: English published: 02 May 2014 updated: 06 Aug 2014 category: Pedagogika author: doc. RNDr. Miloslav Hetteš, CSc source: https://www.prohuman.sk/socialna-praca/preco-kandidujem
We are recalling ten years of Slovakia's participation in the European Union. Was it worth it? Slovakia entered the EU with a much smaller economic strength than it has today. In terms of gross domestic product per capita, we surpassed Portugal and Greece. In purchasing power, even the Czech Republic. Can you believe that? Are we happy about it? According to Nobel Prize laureate in economics Joseph Stiglitz, and also the European Commission, Slovakia is a country where economic growth has not been reflected in a rise in the standard of living. During the referendum on EU accession, I held the view of keeping a sober perspective. Not all that glitters is gold. That is true also for the European Union. The saddest thing is that our politicians often protect foreign interests instead of ours.
Europe in its original Greek meaning means a curious woman. Europe has, at least in words, an interest in a fair and dignified life for its citizens, including ours. Already during the French Revolution at the end of the 18th century, attention was drawn to the unacceptability of excessive differences in wealth. The profit from our economy is not distributed fairly among the citizens of Slovakia, municipalities, and regions. Bratislava is now the 5th richest region in the EU. What comes to us from abroad in the form of European funds is more of a handout than a worthy and fair compensation for our work, productivity, health, and the ruined lives of our children. Rather, the situation is that we support the prosperity of other European countries through the export of dividends and profit.
When I founded Slovak self-government in 1990 (they call me the father of local government), one of my ideas was the effort to protect the interests of municipalities and regions before those of the state. In other words, subsidiarity. In those days, many politicians at the local and regional level still preferred so-called common societal interests over local or regional interests. We first and foremost have to care for our municipality and our homeland. And this also applies to Slovakia's relationship with the European Union. We are responsible for Slovakia first, and then for Europe.
The European Parliament elections are approaching, and they are to take place on 24 May 2014. Slovakia's previous MEPs usually tell us that they do not represent Slovakia but pan-European interests. This is the same nonsense I was trying to remove from our thinking already in 1990.
We live in a country where many citizens do not have work. Unemployment has become a normal situation in a person's life. We do not give young people a chance to work. We do not care for our children. What will come of them? We receive warnings from the European Commission that we are not putting our own funds into active labour-market measures. They say we do not have the resources. Slovakia has, after all, grown economically. The claim that it lacks resources to deal with unemployment is untrue, and yet according to Eurostat it provides “nothing” to eliminate unemployment.
In the European Union, a social non-profit economy operates, providing work to millions of people (about 6% of total employment). One of its main actors is self-government. Why is this not the case in Slovakia? In Europe it is common for health care, municipal waste, energy, water, or services in the public interest to be in the non-profit sector. A private owner can go bankrupt with his social facility, but a municipality must take care of vulnerable people. Profitability is possible in the social sector, but it is not the main goal. We are the only country in Europe where the share of employment in the social sector has declined. Private owners are profitable, but the quality and availability of services have deteriorated rapidly. What should have priority? The health of our children, or questionable monetary profit?
Slovakia is breaching its wage commitments to which it is bound vis-à-vis Europe. We cannot have an economy at three-quarters of EU level and wages of only one-fifth. Cars made in Slovakia are sold at world prices, but wages are exploitative. Wages must be at least tripled, and then internal demand will start and create further jobs and a wish to live in Slovakia. With this increase in wages, a reasonable profit for investors and entrepreneurs would still be assured. Every socially necessary job needs to be rewarded. If citizens care for public matters, for their children, and for their parents, no one rewards them, but if this care is privatized, money suddenly appears.
We have a bad health situation, as shown by the fact that we have a life expectancy in old age six years shorter even than the Czech Republic. The social economy that is common in Europe looks after the well-being of people, not profit for anonymous shareholders in the Cayman Islands and other tax havens. Why can our municipalities and cities not develop social and municipal economies? Profit cannot be at the expense of health and our children.
It is an undeniable fact that we are dying out. In a few generations, Slovakia will not exist. Paradoxically, a labor shortage will then arise. In this ironic way, we could solve unemployment. But in that way? Why do they no longer have this problem in France? Because they care about families there. Lord Marmoth (WHO expert) once answered the question of why the health situation in Slovakia is desperate by saying that they likely do not care about people there. Why do we live at all, if not for our children, who we cannot afford because that is a luxury? Who will care for us, who will feed and comfort us, and who will bury us? Therefore, let decent people have families.
When I lived in the USA, public schools there were essentially spaces for troubled youth who otherwise would disrupt public order. Let's prevent our education system from reaching that state. The European Union points to insufficient education and the state's disinterest in the level of schooling. Slovakia gives only a fraction of what is normal for education, science, and research. In this way, we will not be a partner and contributor in Europe, but only a supplier of cheap uneducated labor. Why do we not want to learn?
Intergenerational, civic, and regional solidarity is the foundation of life and the essence of European integration. The European Commission warns us about the lack of care for the poor and that in Slovakia the permanent gap between rich and poor is growing. We punish the elderly for still being alive. The pensions we promise them are still lower, and today already conflict with Slovakia's obligations. We are at odds with the need for cohesion and solidarity on which European co-existence is built. Europe is built on cohesion and solidarity; why not Slovakia?
In Slovakia, unwarranted poverty is growing despite the right to a social minimum. Up to twenty percent of Slovaks cannot afford a decent standard lunch, one they could afford their parents. It is shameful to accept food aid in a country that once had food self-sufficiency. Even more regrettable is that we “could not manage” to distribute food aid properly and therefore became a disgrace to all of Europe. Now we can ask where we belong. To the European Union, or to the African Union? One person builds a castle and another has no hut. We have two Slovakings, imaginatively divided by apartheid into the world of the wealthy and the world of the poor.
Of course, European authorities point out that Slovakia is no longer creating anything, pointing out that we are only continuously reducing social spending. This cannot be done indefinitely. This is a road to ruin. One needs to have a vision and an idea of what I want to achieve for Slovakia. If I have a business interest, I will fulfill it, but I cannot live only at the expense of others and on debt. We have enough ideas. For example, who knows that the global Mexican food chain is a Slovak idea? What are Slovaks creating today?
The environment has to be a place where one can live and breathe. Why do we sell our country, land, and water so cheaply? Our country, water, and air must not be for sale. We only have them on loan from our forefathers and must pass them on undamaged to our children. We do not need our country plastered with information smog or crowded with gambling halls. Do game halls belong to civic amenities? Such evil is impossible in European cities and municipalities—why is it possible here? Instead of gambling halls we need kindergartens and other civic facilities.
Yes, European institutions are also corrupt, and that is why they need to be kept in check. No one will give us anything for free. But why can we not make use of European funds? Slovakia could receive far more from the European Union than it has so far. We just need to be bolder and insist on Slovak interests. I have known many Slovak subservient representatives in the European Union. Let's get rid of them. We have received several warnings from the European Commission about party nominations for every post. We can often blame ourselves for this ourselves, because everywhere we appoint sons-in-law, daughters-in-law, uneducated people, and obedient ignoramuses, and then we are surprised that the world is unfriendly.
European institutions must not serve their officials, nor be an end in itself for maintaining their prosperity. European institutions must also serve Slovaks. And that is the point. If Europe were to serve only the interests of European bureaucrats, corporations, and only other countries, then Slovakia does not need to be there. That is what the elections to the European Parliament are also about.
Europe must not, under any circumstances, interfere in the lives of people on other continents if no one invited us there, or if it is contrary to international law. First we must protect the shared interests of our municipalities, and only then those of Europe.
I wish that in Europe and at home we would defend our Slovak interests, not foreign ones. I wish that from now on we have in the leadership of the state and in Brussels people we can be proud of. Give capable people a chance.
Abroad, I was successful. I worked as an advisor to foreign governments, led working groups, managed global conferences, taught the world—and why not at home? Abroad they call me a guru of social policy because I was able to do the impossible in international social diplomacy. Must I therefore operate only abroad? I do not want to leave. I want to be here and live with dignity.
In 1992, I still ran on an electoral list with Alexander Dubček. From 1993 onward, I withdrew from domestic politics (it was all just money, theft, and fraud), but now I can no longer stand to watch and stay silent. And so... Our politicians are only interested in their own accounts and in serving foreign and domestic oligarchs. They are preparing a second Ukraine among us. It cannot be accepted. I want to change this as well by using our underutilized membership in the European Union.
Author: doc. RNDr. Miloslav Hetteš, CSc.