“The requirement to be registered and publicly present themselves as an ‘organisation with foreign support’ will likewise create such a chilling effect in the Slovak Republic.”
Hlas MP Samuel Migaľ said the NGO amendment would likely be softened in committee during the second reading, and that “everything will be different from how the law was maybe approved in first reading.”
Migaľ complained on a May 5 talkshow on the TA3 television news channel that unjust “simplifications”” were impugning the NGO bill. “The interior minister isn’t about to slap his stomach [act precipitously] and dissolve some NGOs,” he said. “In the end the minister won’t be the one who decides, but rather a court.”
But Zuzana Petková, a former journalist who leads the Zastavme korupciu (Stop Corruption) NGO, told POLITICO that the “chilling effect” O’Flaherty warned of had already set in since Fico returned to power for a fourth term last fall.
“After I came to our foundation, I wanted to diversify our funding so we wouldn’t be reliant on a single donor,” she said. “That was starting to work, but after the [Sept. 30] election, some of our donors got cold feet because Fico has repeatedly called us his main enemies.
“The objections that the Council of Europe commissioner presented in his letter accurately name the problems that we will have if these changes are passed,” Petková added. “I have heard, however, that due to external pressure, the ruling coalition is considering dropping the labelling of NGOs with funding from abroad. If so, that would be good news.”
