Foreign news agencies, portals and daily newspapers mostly agree on two things: Ivan Korčok's victory over Peter Pellegrini in the first round was a surprise and the real fight for the presidential seat is only now beginning. RTVS journalist Katarína Kučerová informed about this in the RTVS post-election morning show.
Reuters describes Korčok as a pro-European candidate while Peter Pellegrini is described as a key ally of populist Prime Minister Robert Fico. According to them, Korčok's victory was a surprise.
The New York Times wrote: "Although the Slovak presidency is a largely ceremonial post, the election has been closely watched as a test of strength between political forces that want the polarised Central European country to follow Hungary in embracing President Vladimir Putin of Russia and those that want to keep the country aligned with the West."
The daily Guardian quoted Peter Pellegrini who said that the first-round results on Saturday showed a majority did not want a “liberal-right-progressive” president who would only be in conflict with the government.
Interestingly, the Associated Press news agency notes that there was not a single woman among the nine presidential candidates.
Petr Šabata, editor-in-chief of the Czech daily Právo, described the presidential election as a small referendum on the government of Robert Fico. "His government took office after last autumn's elections and rocketed into changing some of the parameters of the rule of law. So you have two clear camps. And if Peter Pellegrini wins, it will be a confirmation that in fact a significant part of Slovakia is basically satisfied with the dismantling of the rule of law," he told Czech Radio Plus.
Czech television is already focusing on the second round of the elections. Referring to experts and commentators, it informs that the key in the second round will be how the advancing candidates mobilise voters and how Robert Fico will get involved in the campaign.
Politico.eu describes Korčok as career diplomat and pro-West candidate. In their article, they cited political analyst Grigorij Mesežnikov who said: "Smer has returned to power and is building essentially an authoritarian system and attempting to change [Slovakia’s] foreign policy orientation. Peter Pellegrini represents this trend."
