Bratislava Policy Institute

Still, describing Heger's cabinet as "new" is arguably a step too far. Heger from the OLaNO (Ordinary People and Independent Personalities) movement merely swapped seats with party leader Matovic, and five of the six ministers who resigned during the crisis have since returned to their posts, with the only new face at the health department.

Male politicians from conservative and far-right parties rallied against it, calling the convention an imposition of "gender ideology" that blurred boundaries between the sexes and undermined traditional family values.

If presidential and EU elections in 2019 were any indication of what to expect in parliamentary polls on February 29, Slovaks can brace for a robust couple of months of campaigning.

"She brought a spirit of positive energy that has broken the bad mood that Slovaks have had for a long time," Zuborova, an analyst at the Bratislava Policy Institute think tank, told BIRN in an interview.

"She also represented a new hope that Slovakia might take a different direction than the rest of Central Europe."