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PARTISAN REVIEW
polls suggest that Meciar will not gather more than a third of the votes and
that the democratic opposition will draw more than half of the votes.
Nevertheless, the majority of the population does not believe that elections
will be free and democratic. They have too much experience with
Vladimir Meciar. Many of them believe that he was involved in the still–
unsolved case of the kidnapping of the president's son three years ago.
They believe that the key witness to the kidnapping was killed on his
orders, that he is in direct contact with the Mafia, or even that he is its
chief.
This situation is the price for the founding of the independent state.
Today it is quite clear that it happened mainly because Meciar desired
absolute power which he could not attain in a joint state with the Czechs.
Slovaks, including those who now hate him, allowed him to proceed
because they believed the myth of the nation-state as a guarantor of their
personal happiness. Today they are unhappy in it and neurotically await the
September elections, which, they hope, will free them of the trauma
known as Meciar.
It's a sad story.
In
1991 and 1992, when I wrote about what this soci–
ety might expect if it believed in this man, I was called a traitor, an enemy
of the nation. Some of my friends with a similar reputation preferred to
move to Prague.
In
the meantime, I predicted everything that came to pass,
with one exception. At that time I was certain that Slovakia was evolving
into an authori tarian regime, since the society lacked the will to defend
democracy. Today, I am not quite so certain about that. But I am quite sure
that I will know before the end of this year. I desire nothing more than to
find out that I was indeed wrong in 1992.
