PS/Spolu convincingly won the European Parliament election

The coalition of new parties PS/Spolu convincingly won the European Parliament election, denying Smer a victory for the first time since 2004. Coalition parties SNS (4.1%) and Most-Híd (2.6%) won’t gain any MEPs, and the extremist party ĽSNS ended up third. Election results (with number of MEPs in brackets):

PS/Spolu 20.1% (4)

Smer 15.7% (3)

ĽSNS 12.1% (2)

KDH 9.7% (2)

SaS 9.6% (2)

OĽaNO 5.3% (1)

The PS/Spolu coalition wants to win the general election in ten months, possibly in a coalition with the new party of Andrej Kiska. Using the threat of extremists it was the best in mobilizing its supporters. The Hungarian parties are likely to merge ahead of the general election to prevent another fiasco. KDH will discuss cooperating with the new KÚ party (Anna Záborská and Branislav Škripek) that won 3.9% of the vote. The strategic decision by the Sme rodina party (3.2%) to cooperate with MENF, a union of populist and anti-immigrant parties, failed.

The center-right EPP party defended its position as the largest EP fraction, having 180 of 751 seats (36 fewer than previously). The socialists S&D will have 152 seats, liberals ALDE 105 seats, and greens EFA 67 seats. Various populist and euro-sceptic parties will have over 100 seats, roughly at the 2014 level. The average voter turnout in the EU was 51% but it was just 23% in Slovakia.

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