June 8 (SeeNews) - Slovenia's president Borut Pahor said he intends to offer to Janez Jansa, leader of centre-right Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS), to form the country's new government after the party won the June 3 early general election.
Pahor will formally offer Jansa the mandate to form government after the parliament convenes sometime next week, the president said in a statement on Thursday following a meeting with Jansa.
Jansa and his party won just under 25% of the vote on Sunday. However, analysts doubt whether he will have enough support to muster a majority in the 90-seat parliament, with most parties having said before the vote they were not going to join a coalition with SDS.
"I will entrust the mandate for the composition of the government to the winner of the parliamentary elections. I think it's right and fair", Pahor noted.
"The winner of the election must be given the opportunity to justify the maximum support received from the people."
Pahor said that in his opinion it is best that the winner of the election forms the government.
"The government can also be formed by someone else, but we know from experience that this is the second best option", he added.
Analysts have predicted that a wide center-left government coalition led by newcomer List of Marjan Sarec (LMS) party looks like the baseline scenario. LMS won 13 seats in parliament in the election.
Alen Kovac from Erste Group explained earlier this week that Marjan Sarec is the front-runner for the position of prime minister, while his government coalition would consist of five or six parties.
According to the latest data from the electoral commission, with 99.99% of the votes counted, SDS has won 25 seats, LMS - 13, the Social Democrats (SD) - 10, the Modern Center Party (SMC) of caretaker prime minister Miro Cerar - 10, The Left - 9, the New Slovenia - Christian Democrats (NSi) - 7, Alenka Bratusek's Party (SAB) 5, the Democratic Party of Pensioners of Slovenia (DeSUS) also 5, and the Slovenian National Party (SNS) 4 seats. Two seats are secured for MPs representing the Italian and Hungarian minorities.