November 16 (SeeNews) - Slovenia’s Parliament has received a request by Prime Minister Janez Jansa for a confidence vote in the centre-right coalition government and is expected to vote on the motion within seven days, the parliament said on Friday.
"The parliament will vote on Monday at 1400 local time (1300 GMT) whether to extend its session on Monday and hold the vote at 1800 (1700 GMT),” Klementina Sluga, public relations officer of Parliament Speaker France Cukjati, told SeeNews.
Sluga said that if the parliament decides not to vote on Monday, then an extraordinary session will be scheduled. The vote will be held within seven days, she added.
Late on Thursday, Jansa said in an interview for state-run broadcaster TV Slovenija that he would call a confidence vote in his government in parliament. Two days earlier he said he did not rule out the possibility of his cabinet resigning after Danilo Turk, supported by centre-left parties, won Sunday’s run-off vote for president of the Alpine country.
“It would be irresponsible to say that we have normal conditions for work if we will fight on two fronts,” Jansa said in the interview for TV Slovenija. The country will take over the rotating presidency of the European Union for six months on January 1.
Turk, a former senior U.N. diplomat, won 68.23% support in Sunday’s run-off vote, according to preliminary data released by the State Election Commission. His rival, Lojze Peterle, backed by three major parties from the centre-right government coalition, received only 31.77% support. The commission is expected to release final results on November 20 or 21.
Analysts, quoting public opinion polls, have said Turk’s victory shows a clear decline in voters’ support for the government.
The Slovenian government coalition comprises Jansa’s Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS), the People's Party (SLS), the pensioners' party DeSUS and the New Slovenia (NSi) party.
The government coalition has 49 seats in the 90-seat parliament. However, DeSUS, which has four seats in the parliament, supported Turk at the presidential elections.