/FROM THE SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT OF DENÍKU/ The Slovak elections have a big pre-election scandal, which concerns the house that has been secretly used by the Speaker of the Parliament, Peter Pellegrini. But the newspaper also found out how things are with the house by the beach of his opponent Ivan Korčok.
The reporter of Deník Luboš Palata visited Senec, where Ivan Korčok lives. | Video: Deník/Luboš Palata
Z Bratislava it’s fifteen minutes on the freeway if it’s not congested. The 20,000-year-old Senec is the first town near Bratislava where there are already bilingual signs. Original Hungarian population it is here due to immigration from the nearby and, when it comes to apartments in the much overpriced capital city, but today only a real minority. Today, this city, which is mostly blockhouses and lies on the plain of Žitné ostrov, has not taken away much of its beauty. But there is one place that makes it worth living here and commuting to the metropolis thirty kilometers away every day.
Central Europe’s largest block of flats hasn’t changed much in thirty-five years:
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It looks like the sea here. The Sun Lakes, which were created by dredging sand for the construction of a railway line already in the nineteenth century, after their later connection created a giant water area with an area of over one hundred hectares and a depth of up to twelve meters. In 1919, they opened the first public swimming pool here under the catchy name Slovak Tahiti.
Now it’s feverishly preparing for the start of the season here. Buffets are opening, some of them already have sunbeds, and restaurant owners are looking forward to the weekend, when it will be almost thirty degrees in Slovakia. “There were already a lot of people here at Easter, now we are starting the main season. This is great,” praises the owner of a snack bar by the grass-sand beach next to the clear water.
Korčok has its own beach
Here, in the middle of “Slovak Tahiti”, where a replica of a sailing ship is moored, after several ambassador posts abroad, the favorite of the presidential elections found his second home Ivan Korčok. In an exclusive location that is not affected by the hustle and bustle of the local beaches.
The bay in Rybářské Street is perfectly isolated from the events on the other side of the lake. The three-meter-wide alley is a dead end, so anyone who wants to see the house of a possible future Slovak head of state must either swim to it or sail to it on a punt or other non-motorized boat.
Ivan Korčok also found his second home in the middle of “Slovak Tahiti” after several ambassador posts abroad. Source: Deník/Luboš Palata
With the very low water temperature and the lack of punts in the equipment of the Deník reporter’s department, I had to settle for the view from the pier on the other bank. It could also be seen from it that Korčok has a small jetty near the house, when he goes swimming, he can go in his bathing suit straight from the living room, and the house has a small grassy garden.
Not much can be seen from the street, just a high wall and a large garage door. The name tag on the doorbell is missing, visitors are monitored by security cameras, but almost every property here has them.
With the sum of the votes for all candidates ideologically closer to Pellegrini, the Speaker of the Parliament remains the paper favorite. But participation will be key:
One hundred thousand more votes. Korčok won the first round of the Slovak presidential election
Korčok calls the house a “cottage”, but he does not hide the fact that he and his wife live in it, even though they also have another apartment in Bratislava. “Sometimes I go to Bratislava from Sence by bike,” says Korčok, a young man in his sixties, a top volleyball player in his youth.
Locals mostly support him and some meet him on dog walks. But where he lives, he has no idea. “I know it’s here somewhere by the lake. That house over there, you see. I had no idea,” says fifty-year-old Andrej.
Pellegrini’s house from a friend
S Peter Pellegrini and his residence in Bratislava makes it much more complicated. Similarly, compared to Korčok, a married father of two grown-up children, who lives happily all his life with his wife, whom he met at a volleyball game “even before the war”, his privacy is also more complex and secretive.
Speaker of Parliament, of which inclination towards men has been speculated for years, but he himself never openly admitted it, he never had any official partner. When announcing his candidacy two months ago in Banská Bystrica, he avoided the topic. “I don’t share a common household with anyone,” Pellegrini said in front of supporters of his Hlas and other supporters at the opera house of his hometown.
The reporter of Deník Luboš Palata visited the Slovak village of Králiky, where Peter Pellegrini lives:
The time has returned when a person in Slovakia can be punched just for being Czech
“If I am given the trust, I will not be accompanied by the first lady or any other person during the exercise of the function,” added Pellegrini.
But at the end of the campaign, everything got complicated. The flight of Hlas MP Peter Náhlik’s private plane to the east of Slovakia is to blame for everything, after which the former prime minister and now head of the Slovakian opposition party Igor Matovič published a video from Náhlik’s villa in Bratislava’s Vrakuni. The house is large, in a quiet street by the Little Dunaj, but in an otherwise not very nice suburb of Bratislava full of apartment buildings.
Bratislava’s Vrakuň district, where Peter Náhlik’s villa stands. Source: Deník/Luboš Palata
Pellegrini, who is often seen there by the neighbors, had to admit in a duel with Korčok on Markíza TV that he was “borrowing” the villa from Náhlik for housing. Especially in situations where his parents from Banská Bystrica come to see him. Because, as Pellegrini himself stated, an 86-meter apartment in a new luxury district in the center is not enough for that.
“It lifted a lot of people up. We all know how much apartments cost here in Bratislava and how big they are,” an elderly Bratislava resident tells me.
Source: Deník/Luboš Palata
In addition, the Náhlik house did not mention it in its own tax overview MP for 2022. The media has now also published photos of Pellegrini and Náhlik from their vacation in Verona, Italy in 2022. In addition, Matovič claims that Pellegrini legalizes his illegal income through Náhlik. However, Pellegrini has never been accused of anything. “I will not comment on the fool Matovič,” he said in the final election debate on Slovak Television and Radio.
In the pre-election debates, however, Korčok did not single out the house, the person of Pellegrini’s friend, or the property relations of the speaker of the parliament, and he did not criticize or comment on the privacy of his opponent.
