The Slovenian National Party (Slovene: Slovenska Nacionalna Stranka, SNS) is an extreme nationalist political party in Slovenia, led by Zmago Jelinčič Plemeniti. The party is renowned for its euroscepticism and opposes Slovenia's membership in NATO. It also opposes what it considers historical revisionism of events in Slovenia during World War II and, to an extent, is sympathetic towards the former Yugoslav Communist regime of Josip Broz Tito. Although the party usually refuses to position itself within a left-right political spectrum, its president Zmago Jelinčič Plemeniti defined himself as left wing in a 2000 interview for the magazine Mladina.
At the Slovenian legislative elections on 21 September 2008, the party won 5.4% of the popular vote and five out of ninety seats, which is one less than at the previous election in 2004. Srečko Prijatelj, a former SNS member of the National Assembly, was in September 2010 the first member of the Slovenian parliament sentenced to prison. At the 2011 Slovenian parliamentary election on 4 December 2011, the party won 1.80% of votes, thus not reaching the parliamentary threshold of 4%.
The party has been led by Zmago Jelinčič since its founding in 1991. Jelinčič has often shifted the focus of the party's ideology in order to suit changing popular sentiment in Slovenia. In the early 1990s, the party led a chauvinist discourse against immigrants from former Yugoslav republics. This was somewhat moderated later, but the party continues to voice strongly anti-Croatian positions. Among other things, Jelinčič has proposed that the national border with Croatia be sealed, apart from two custom stations for trade, until the territorial dispute with Croatia is resolved (primarily the issue of the maritime border on the Gulf of Piran and several small areas along the land border). He also advocates improving relationships with Serbia and has opposed the independence of Kosovo. The SNS frequently and loudly demands better treatment of Slovene minorities in Italy, Austria and Hungary.
The party's ideology has been strongly anti-Catholic and has advocated a firm laicist position. Its leaders have been frequently accused of chauvinist and even racist attitudes towards certain minorities, particularly Slovenia's Roma population. The party also strongly opposes gay rights. Several of its MPs, including the party's former deputy chairman Sašo Peče, have publicly made numerous openly homophobic remarks. The party also has a strong anti-Roma discourse.
Read more about Slovenian National Party: Party Foundations, Leadership and Program
Famous quotes containing the words national and/or party:
“Perhaps our national ambition to standardize ourselves has behind it the notion that democracy means standardization. But standardization is the surest way to destroy the initiative, to benumb the creative impulse above all else essential to the vitality and growth of democratic ideals.”
—Ida M. Tarbell (1857–1944)
“When the doctrine of allegiance to party can utterly up-end a man’s moral constitution and make a temporary fool of him besides, what excuse are you going to offer for preaching it, teaching it, extending it, perpetuating it? Shall you say, the best good of the country demands allegiance to party? Shall you also say it demands that a man kick his truth and his conscience into the gutter, and become a mouthing lunatic, besides?”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)