Slovakia in 2021: Do-or-Die Moment for Reformist Government

"The crisis is very real and someone will have to take responsibility for it. At this point, it's hard to predict whether the government will still hold on to its constitutional majority in three months' time," political commentator Peter Tkacenko told BIRN.

Matovic swept to victory in last year's general election on a promise to clear up the corruption that had penetrated the very highest echelons of the state. Instead, he found himself mired in political infighting, with Deputy Prime Minister Richard Sulik his favourite combatant.

Both party leaders have repeatedly clashed over the handling of the pandemic, with the liberal-minded Sulik advocating for more piecemeal measures as opposed to Matovic's backing of a steep national lockdown.

The conflicting approaches often resulted in contradictory messages that left the country reeling from a rampant spread of coronavirus and drove the public health system to the brink of collapse, with a sharp increase in infections by the turn of the year.

In early December, Slovak President Zuzana Caputova went out of her way to publicly denounce Matovic's crisis management and advised the prime minister to let go of the steering wheel in matters related to the pandemic. Yet the Matovic-Sulik squabble stretched deep into the final days of 2020, when the prime minister publicly invited Sulik to step down while on air with Radio Expres.

There will be attempts to unseat and replace Matovic in the following months.

- Michal Vasecka

While Sulik was quick to play down the backhanded compliment, his protracted row with Matovic seems to be playing into his hands, as the latest polls attest. Matovic's popularity has plummeted among voters, with only a quarter...