There will be election in Slovenia scheduled for 24/04. that could be very important for the region. Especially for Hungary and Poland. In last few years (especially under PM Janša) Hungary has increase investments in Slovenia. They had invested a lot in energy sector, banking, turism and even in media. We could say that those are strategic investments which aim is interconnect both countries in a long run. But opposition in Slovenia is against selling stakes in companies to Hungarian investors. In criticism they are pointing to usual mantra of autocratic leadership of Viktor Orban and are even compering  PM Janša with him. And if we can trust current pre election polls the opposition will assemble next government. That can spell some troubles for Hungary (Orban) in future. Orban is having trouble with EU leadership, NGOs, Zelenskyy and on top all this even with Poland in recent times. And it is expected that situation between all of mentioned will only get worse. So last thing Orban needs right now is to have unfriendly government on its border.

Change of government will definitely have an impact on Orban especially because of strategic location of Slovenia. There are some important trade routes going through Slovenia. One is Port of Trieste (Italy) and second is Port of Koper (Slovenia). This is why Hungary was keen on modernizing railway system in Slovenia especially from Italy border and from Koper. If Hungary was to orient more on east they will need solid connection to sea. It is true that in recent years a lot was invested in Budapest-Belgrade railway but let us not forget that in order to link (and to work) this railway to port in Greece it needs to go through North Macedonia. And this region can easily be destabilized by US/NATO if needed. So in worst case scenario Hungary can be easily cut of from access to sea especially now that they have troubles with Poland. Let us not forget that current opposition in Slovenia has good ties with Germany (master-servent sort of ties) and will do anything to please the master. So in time that hybrid war on Orban will probably intensify it will be important what kind of neighbor one have. Or like PM Janša just said to Orban “It’s good to have friends as neighbour”.

Same goes for Poland if Slovenia reorient itself from closer ties with Visegrad group ( Slovenia is very close in recent times to Visegrad group) to Germany. Then Poland could lose one more friend in region.  That could spell trouble for Poland especially before elections next year.

In time of big political changes that we are witnessing every country will play its role. We are all too interconnected not to be alert on this kind of changes even if it is just small country like Slovenia.

Ofcourse there can always be surprises in election especially now that new parties were formed from protest movement (anti-covid dominates). But nevertheless I’m pretty sure that Janša will no longer be PM and that Germany will once more become our Master. But there is one more thing that need to be said here. My opinion is that long time of political instability is coming to Slovenia and no one will be able to form a stable government. That means we will be just a puppet state open for foreign interference. And we all know who wants countries to be that way.