A newly formed protest party in Slovenia beat Janez Jansa, a nationalist prime minister who has challenged the European Union’s democratic standards, by an unexpectedly wide margin in general elections.
Against the backdrop of the war in Ukraine, and as French voters gave President Emmanuel Macron a new term, former executive Robert Golob and his upstart Freedom Movement are positioned to create a new left-leaning government and reverse policies introduced by Jansa that they say undermine the rule of law.
Freedom Movement won about 34% of the vote, versus 24% for Jansa’s Slovenian Democratic Party, according to partial official results with more than 95% of ballots counted on Sunday. The tally resembled an exit poll published when voting ended that showed five parties had won seats in the 90-member parliament.
