Matovic: Slovakia Governed More Responsibly in 2020-23 Than Most EU Countries

Bratislava, April 22 (TASR) - Slovakia managed its economy more responsibly than most EU countries on average in 2020-23, 'Slovakia' party chair and former premier [2020-21] Igor Matovic declared on Monday. Matovic spoke in response to preliminary 2023 economic data released earlier in the day by the Statistics Office. "For the first time, the Slovak Republic husbanded its resources better than an average EU country or average eurozone country," claimed Matovic. "For the first time, we ran our economy better on average than our European partners." The 'Slovakia' chair added that for the first time ever, Slovakia in that period had boasted better economic results than an average EU country by 0.7 percentage point. According to Matovic's calculations, the current government lacks about €2.8 billion in this year's budget. "On behalf of taxpayers, we'd like to hear how they intend to plug up this hole," said Matovic. Matovic added that the released data showed that the incumbent government planned to use an accounting trick for this year's budget to make a cosmetic deficit reduction. This view was echoed also by the non-parliamentary 'Democrats' party. According to the 'Democrats' vice-chair and former premier [2021-23] Eduard Heger, the Statistics Office data has refuted the notion that his former cabinet is to blame for the disintegration of public finances. "The lion's share of responsibility for the bad state of public finances is carried by [previous] governments of Smer, which were squandering public money in good times and failed to prepare the country for future times of adversity," he said. mf/mcs