By Compiled by Spectator staff
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Slovakia’s culture minister, Martina Šimkovičová, is under fire after it emerged her ministry spent almost €16,000 on flights for her and a senior aide to the United States – a sum anti-corruption campaigners say points to business or first-class travel.
The watchdog group Zastavme korupciu (Stop Corruption Foundation) said the tickets were purchased for Šimkovičová and her head of communications, Petra Demková, for a September trip to New York. Two other officials booked on the same day paid just €4,330 in total.
The ministry has not explained the discrepancy. Asked for comment, Demková said only: “I have nothing to say to you and we will not comment.” Before hanging up, she added: “I will not communicate with anyone financed by a foreign power.”
Šimkovičová, a former television presenter who became culture minister two years ago in Robert Fico’s nationalist-populist coalition, has repeatedly courted controversy with her ties to nationalist figures and her outspoken attacks on liberal media, LGBT+ people and NGOs.
Her ministry’s spending has come under increasing scrutiny. Last autumn she also travelled to the US, beginning in New York with a Slovak diaspora church service and a jazz concert organised with the Slovak consulate. She later visited Slovak communities in Florida – where her daughter Petra lives – and in Iowa, where she donated €10,000 to the National Czech and Slovak Museum and Library. The trip concluded at a Slovak heritage festival in New Jersey and cost €30,000 in total.
Back then, she accused the media of spreading disinformation and of paying less attention to other ministers’ foreign trips than to her own.
The latest revelation comes as Fico’s government pushes through its third consolidation package, expected to save €2.3 billion. Excluding €435 million in energy aid, households and businesses will contribute €1.4 billion, while the state has pledged €900 million in budget savings.
