Both minorities in Slovenia to cast their votes in local elections
Ljubljana, 11 October - In the November local elections, members of the Italian and Hungarian minorities in Slovenia will elect their representatives on municipal councils under special voting rights. This will take place in four municipalities in the western region Primorska and five municipalities in the north-eastern region Prekmurje.
The two autochthonous ethnic communities in Slovenia, the Italian and the Hungarian, are guaranteed all rights under the constitution and relevant international treaties. In municipalities where they live their direct representation in municipal bodies is also guaranteed.
Under the law on local elections, these ethnically mixed municipalities guarantee at least one minority member on the municipal council, or one tenth of the total number of councillors.
The largest number of minority councillors is both in the Koper municipality, where the Italian minority has three representatives on the 33-strong council, and on the 25-member council in the Piran municipality. In Izola there are two representatives and in Ankaran one.
The Hungarian minority elects their representatives to municipal councils in Lendava, Moravske Toplice, Dobrovnik, Šalovci and Hodoš. In the first two, they have two representatives and in the rest there is one minority representative.
Candidates for minority representatives are picked by minority voters themselves and backed by at least 15 voter signatures. They are elected under a majority voting system.
The Dobrovnik municipality in the north-east of the country, home to a significant Hungarian ethnic community, is a special case, as a representative of Slovenians living there is also elected separately in what is a result of the smaller number of Slovenians living there compared to the Hungarian community.
The municipality has a total population of just over 1,300 residents, more than half of whom are of Hungarian ethnicity. Under law, the municipality guarantees that the 11-member council features one representative of the Hungarian minority, one from the Roma community and one representative of the Slovenian nation.
For the latter's election candidates are selected by the Interior Ministry, Ester Povše, the municipality's secretary, told the STA. They hold Slovenian citizenship and do not have the right to vote as members of either the Roma or Hungarian community. Candidates from these two communities are picked by the communities themselves, she added.
Local elections usually coincide with elections to Italian and Hungarian councils of municipal self-governing ethnic communities.
In addition to representation on municipal bodies, the two minorities are also represented in Slovenia's parliament, where there is one MP for each community.