Slovenia's Referendum on the TV Licence Fee Flipped Overnight: a 692-Vote Margin, and Postal Ballots Will Decide

Slovenia's referendum on scrapping the public broadcaster's licence fee delivered a twist that only those who stayed up until morning got to see. Until the early hours, more voters were in favour of abolishing it. With 99.98 percent of ballots counted, the picture flipped: 50.04 percent against abolition, 49.96 percent in favour. In numbers: 461,765 against, 461,073 for. A margin of 692 votes.

The result isn't final yet. Postal votes will decide it: electoral commissions are counting ballots sent from within Slovenia, and the results of votes from abroad will be confirmed on 19 October.

How much money are we talking about? The fee in Slovenia is 14.02 euros a month, or 168.24 euros a year. In neighbouring Croatia people pay 10.62 euros a month, or 127.44 euros a year. The referendum on the fee is consultative - the government isn't legally bound to implement it, but Prime Minister Janez Janša promised to respect the will of the people.

Four referendums in one day

Slovenians voted in four referendums on the same day. The only legislative, binding one was on amendments to the Parliamentary Inquiries Act, and they were defeated with 51.26 percent against. Civic associations, backed by the opposition, collected the required 40,000 signatures, arguing that the amendments strip citizens of legal protection, give politicians too much power to intrude on privacy and effectively introduce a political police. A group of legal experts from the law faculties in Ljubljana and Maribor warned that the changes lower the standards for conducting parliamentary inquiries.

In the other two consultative referendums, 60.54 percent backed the idea of making welfare conditional on community work, and 55.29 percent voted to strip third-country nationals of the right to vote. Janša said the government would respect the will of the people, and opposition leader Robert Golob retorted that the government doesn't have the public's trust.

Slovenia asked its citizens directly whether they want to pay for their public broadcaster - and almost exactly half said no. That's not just a verdict on one monthly bill, but on trust in the television they fund. How many public broadcasters in the Balkans would survive the same question?