At the reception of the EuroBasket champions, the Slovenian government, through the minister for education and SMC presidential candidate, Dr Maja Makovec Brenčič, has informed the public that it would allocate €50,000 for the players (which is half of the controversial amount that the government allocated from the state budget for the referendum campaign). Inappropriate, shameful, disparaging, and maybe even worse.
“Instead of political crumbs and the exploitation of sports successes, the Slovenian sport needs a systematic funding arrangement, but this is something that Miro Cerar’s government has not been able to provide in three years,” said the press release from the Good State (Dobra država) institute, where they stress that it is also necessary to think of the athletes who did not succeed due to injuries and other circumstances, and particularly of the development of young people.
The amendment to the Gaming Act, which could ensure a more stable funding of the Slovenian Sports Foundation (Fundacija za šport), has been shelved due to lobbies linked to the failing private company Športna loterija, which is still being protected by legally and economically senseless monopolistic protection, allowing millions of euro for sports funding to flow abroad without supervision.
Cerar’s government is behaving very stingily towards the Slovenian heroes – current EuroBasket champions and at the same time representatives of a government full of nice phrases, of politicians that take advantage of every opportunity to be photographed with them. They are gathering political points through the success of Slovenian athletes, but the money, according to the opinion and actions of the current government, is better spent on their own referendum campaign than on a historical achievement in Slovenian team sport and a decent reward and further investment in Slovenian sport. Another indicator that the second track project is the project that will make or break the current government. The crucial Sunday (24 September 2017) is close, and it needs to be remembered that every vote counts. A vote with which a new theft of Slovenian taxpayers’ money can be prevented.
D. Č.